Recently Mentioned Books

6. Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Blithedale Romance .  I’m surprised this novel doesn’t attract more ongoing attention, even if some of the final plot choices seem a bit strange or forced.  It is a brilliant critique of utopianism, socialism, Romanticism, and also philanthropy.  I kept on thinking Arnold Kling should read it.  In any case it is a marvelous story, a good read, and chock full of social science.  You’ll find one controversial reading of the story here (jstor), a panoply of speculative h...

5. Joshua Gans, The Disruption Dilemma .  A very good introduction to the game theory and institutions of “disruptive innovation,” the book also dispels many myths about that concept.

4. L. Jon Wertheim and Sam Sommers, This is Your Brain on Sports: The Science of Underdogs, the Value of Rivalry, and What We Can Learn from the T-Shirt Cannon .  I enjoyed this book and found it reasonably analytical.  There is a “home court” advantage even during hockey fights, and having sex before a big game doesn’t seem to diminish performance.

3. Albert Camus, The Stranger .  Worth a reread, especially if you grew up with something other than the Matthew Ward translation.  Surprisingly current in its orientation and interests.

2. Ted Gioia, How to Listen to Jazz .  Delivers what the title promises, in short, readable form; this book is good for either the jazz lover or the beginner.  I am a big fan of pretty much anything Ted Gioia does, and this book has not broken the streak.  By the way, here is Gioia on Ortega y Gasset and his continuing relevance .

1. Jonathan Bate, Ted Hughes: The Unauthorised Life .  Fun, lots of sex for a serious book, and it makes you appreciate the diversity of human beings.

4. Excellent Tom Wainwright piece on how economists would approach the problem of addictive drugs .  His forthcoming book Narconomics looks very good, I put in my pre-order.

Fawaz A. Gerges, ISIS: A History .

Charles R. Lister, The Syrian Jihad: Al-Qaeda, the Islamic State and the Evolution of an Insurgency .

Daniel Oppenheimer, Exit Right: The People Who Left the Left and Reshaped the American Century .

Peter Conti-Brown, The Power and Independence of the Federal Reserve .

Kenneth Scheve and David Stasavage, Taxing the Rich: A History of Fiscal Fairness in the United States and Europe .

That is the new and excellent book by Caroline Freund ; the subtitle is The Rise of Emerging-market Tycoons and Their Mega Firms .  It looks at the rise of billionaires in emerging markets, offers a new data base on how they earned their wealth, and takes a generally “pro-billionaire” stance, at least relative to many other sources.

That is from new and interesting Education Unchained: What It Takes to Restore Schools and Learning , by Erik Lidström, mostly from a Hayekian perspective.  The author claims, by the way, that the Finnish model has been declining since it has been made more student-centered and less teacher-centered.

Recommended, here is the Amazon link .  And here is Jason Kottke on the book .  And here is a good Malcolm Harris review .

1. The subtitle is A New Theory of Chinese History , and volume one has just been translated and published from the Chinese.

The book is due out in April .

I hope to report on other interesting sections of the book soon; it is due out in April .  Again, most business cycles in history have been real business cycles .

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is one of America’s leading public intellectuals . I would describe him as an offshoot of the Harlem Renaissance, and what he and I share in common is a fascination with the character of Mycroft Holmes, the subject of Kareem’s latest book — and that of course, is Sherlock Holmes’s brother.

2. Novelist : I draw a blank, sorry people…Does it count that Joe Haldeman ( The Forever War ) was a product of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop?  There must be other examples as well.

His latest entry into this debate [over stagnation], The Rise and Fall of American Growth , is likely to be the most interesting and important economics book of the year. It provides a splendid analytic take on the potency of past economic growth, which transformed the world from the end of the nineteenth century onward.

The author is Sam Bowles and the subtitle is Why Good Incentives are No Substitute for Good Citizens .

The subtitle of Thomas Leonard’s new and excellent book is the apt Race, Eugenics & American Economics in the Progressive Era .

That is the title of the new and forthcoming Robin Hanson book, due out in May .  I was asked to supply a blurb, and offered two possibilities.  One was:

5. Heather Boushey, Finding Time: The Economics of Work-Life Conflict .