A wedding in San José del Cabo, visiting my mom in Henderson, NV, a quick trip to Big Bear and Newport Beach, painting a couple rooms along with other home projects, and beginning a new job were some of the activity that occupied my time this past June and July, so I didn’t read as many books as I’d anticipated. Nevertheless, I’m thankful for the seven I did finish. Some of these titles were companions I listened to while working on projects and traveling. Others were read in my cool library during the recent sweltering days. It was a summer of reflection regarding not only what I plan to accomplish professionally, but also creatively.
I hope you’ve had a summer in which you could enjoy some good books. On with the list.
The Right Call: What Sports Teach Us About Work and Life by Sally Jenkins (Hardback)
Jenkins takes the most famous athletes and coaches and shares the practices they deploy that the reader can adopt within any industry. Many contemporary athletes are discussed, and I found it interesting to read about the strategies and tactics they use to compete while at their peak performance. One of my favorite parts is chapter 8, entitled “Intention.” As a principal last school year I thought a lot about intentionality. Teachers need to be intentional when developing lesson plans, and principals must be intentional when communicating the vision of the school. A majority of chapter 8 delves into Tom Brady’s intentionality; Jenkins writes, “(Brady’s) greatness was not in the power of his arm but in the power of his intention to decide for himself who he wanted to be.” People often just let things happen to them in life; Brady makes things happen.
Jenkins also writes the following: “Knowledge is actually the second quality that followers look for in a leader… long before anyone assesses your expertise, they will neurocognitively assess your intentions and whether your motives toward them are warm or cold.” It’s pretty wild to think that people have the ability to accurately assess our intentions, and it’s that perception that greatly affects the way they judge us.
The Education of a Value Investor: My Transformative Quest for Wealth, Wisdom, and Enlightenment by Guy Spier (Audible)
I recommend pairing this with a book I wrote about in May: Richer, Wiser, Happier: How the World’s Greatest Investors Win in Markets and Life by William Green. Both provide information for how to build wealth and live meaningfully, and there’s no better people to listen to for attaining these goals than Warren Buffet and his business partner Charlie Munger–both of whom are mentioned continuously in the books. I could listen to Munger’s stories and advice for hours because not only has he proven himself to be savvy in the world of business, but he has also experienced devastating hardships and never publicly characterized himself as a victim. His outlook on life is an antidote to the softness in which our 21st century minds have fallen.
Both The Education of a Value Investor and Richer, Wiser, Happier encouraged me to reassess my philosophy for saving and investing. In addition to upping my monthly 403(b) contribution, I moved much of my holdings into investments I believe Buffet and Munger would approve of–and I believe that’s an excellent barometer when deciding what to do with your money.
Excellent Advice for Living: Wisdom I Wish I’d Know Earlier by Kevin Kelly (Hardback)
I took my time with this short book. Kelly writes only a few sentences of wisdom on each page. In some cases there’s only one sentence per page. His advice is so meaningful and important, it helps to take it in slowly to fully absorb the lessons.
Kelly published much of these morsels online throughout the years, so I’d previously read a handful of them before purchasing the book. I appreciated seeing his advice again in a contained book, and the experience of reading it was a reminder of the important things I inevitably forget while going through the motions of living.
Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey (Audible)
While I’m confident reading a hardback or paperback version of this book is a worthwhile experience, listening to the Audible version of McConaughey himself reading his words is by far more entertaining. You know McConaughey’s voice: slow and twangy with shots of joviality that create a warm, southern atmosphere as he recounts his life in this autobiography. At times he’s your cool laid-back neighbor; at others he’s holding court while stretching out stories and enjoying the experience of listening to himself talk. And on the rare occasion, he reaches somewhere deep within to release a hidden intensity that can be provoked under the right circumstances, which I suppose is how he’s able to bring characters such as Rust Cohle to life.
Greenlights made me like McConaughey’s wit and charm. I wish it were longer, which is high praise for any book. (Recently, I wish for most books and films to be shorter.) This is possibly the best autobiography I’ve read by a contemporary celebrity.
Works by Cormac McCarthy:
On June 13 as I was waiting with my wife in the airport to depart from San José del Cabo, I received a text from a college friend sharing that Cormac McCarthy died. I wasn’t shocked, McCarthy was 89-years-old at the time of his passing, but I was affected. I said for years he was my favorite living American author. Now what is he… simply my favorite author? Yes, I suppose so.
I hadn’t read all of his novels, so I made out to do so. I also read a play that I’d seen on TV. Now I just have a screenplay and a five act play to read, and I believe I’ll have read all his published work.
The Sunset Limited by Cormac McCarthy (Paperback)
I watched this on HBO back around 2012 and found it extremely well-acted. Even though it has been over 10 years since I’d seen it, and I’d forgotten many of the details, the end of the play was still etched in my memory. As the plot propels forward toward that conclusion–similar to the train the story is named after–I was dreading what was ahead. As you can imagine with anything written by McCarthy, the characters’ destinies are ponderous and open for interpretation.
Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy (Paperback)
Rinthy Holme is in search for her missing baby, and her brother is in search for her during the beginning of the 20th century. They experience many misfortunes, and they face each experience with seeming indifference. The “outer dark” McCarthy describes is too much for the main characters to fully grasp, as well as their part in it. The novel is a grim portrait of humans blindly attempting to navigate a path through that darkness.
The Orchard Keeper by Cormac McCarthy (Paperback and Audible)
If this were the first novel McCarthy wrote and (let’s pretend) he never wrote another book, as an author I would have characterized him as boring, pretentious, and immensely gifted. Fortunately in his second novel, Outer Dark, he held onto the beautiful prose and crafted a comprehensible story with a plot containing some forward momentum. McCarthy is one of those rare authors who became better as he aged. His later work was less wordy, which for me is more effective both stylistically and emotionally. He learned to do what the great artists can accomplish: strip the work away until it’s as perfect as possible.
Side note: After I began reading The Orchard Keeper, I discovered it was free on Audible, so this is a rare occasion in which I began reading the paperback then switched to the audiobook version. I actually skipped back and forth. Listening to McCarthy’s prose read aloud is an interesting and beautiful experience, but I found it very hard to follow. Instead of tracking the plot, I kept settling into the rhythms of the actor narrating the story, which is why I had to reread some portions in the paperback to understand what was happening. At least upon a first read, McCarthy is best read and not listened to.
RISE AND CONVERGE 