A-Ware's Book Project

"Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth."  - Henry David Thoreau, Walden The last time I remember Grandma giving me a book recommendation was in 1999. I was a freshman in college and the book was Into the Wild by John Krakauer. I don't remember if she gave it to me because she had read it and thought I would like it, or because that summer she had noticed me reading Into Thin Air and thought I'd like another book by the same author. Either way, I loved that book. It ranks in the top five most influential of my life. It's the true story of a young man named Chris McCandless, who grew up in suburban Virginia in the 70s and 80s. Upon finishing college he suddenly and unexpectedly severed all ties with his family and embarked on an adventure across the United States. Along the way he kept a journal in the margins of his favorite books, and shared with friends his personal philosophy: that a life of simplicity and adventure is the only ...

It is nice to live in a world where we can look back and feel happy about all the progress we've made as a society. Americans have thrown off tyrants, established democracy, abolished slavery, enfranchised women, won two world wars, eradicated a long list of diseases, and - when comparing against global standards - eliminated poverty. We should feel proud of what we've accomplished. But we can't stop now. In Half the Sky, Nick Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn argue that the global sex trade is the great moral issue of our time and that we must take up this fight with as much dedication and energy as William Wilberforce and Frederic Douglas took up theirs.  This book tells dozens of stories about real women and girls around the world who are victims of a litany of horrible crimes including sex slavery, rape and beatings, honor killings, and genital cutting. The stories are graphic, sparing no detail, precisely because Nick and Sheryl want to shock you into recognizing ...

"Tell me about what you're reading, but don't tell me to read it." That's the way I've approached every conversation about books in the last ten years. I have some kind of strange insecurity that says a book recommended by someone else is a book I didn't discover myself, which means it can't possibly be good. Or rather if someone else is reading it then it must be totally mainstream, which makes it stupid by definition, so why would I read it? There are three things wrong with this. First, it's hypocritical. If you look at the books I've read, it's not like it's some list of obscure titles that no one reads but me. It's a lot of mainstream stuff that everyone on Earth has read like Moneyball and Life of Pi. Second, when a book does go mega-mainstream I get snooty and refuse to read it and so end up missing out, for example, on geniuses like Malcolm Gladwell because I'm trying to act like I'm too good for popular books. Th...