Recently Read

The Girl on the Train, by Paula Hawkins. This is just as suspenseful and engaging as you've no doubt already heard. It definitely has a "Gone Girl" vibe. Very unlikable characters, but I was still hooked. I loved it, and Kevin did as well.

Leading the Life You Want: Skills for Integrating Work and Life, by Stewart Friedman.  Friedman analyzes six highly successful people - including Michelle Obama, Julie Foudy, and Bruce Springsteen - and identifies some of their key traits and the strategies they utilize in their lives. The book was only okay overall, but a few of the overall points did sink in. Largely, the idea of integrating your life and not trying to segregate "work" from "life". Since having kids, I've always tried to keep a very firm dividing line between work and home. Living that way, I realize that it only magnifies the feeling that I'm somehow wasting the time I spend at work. It's not good. Instead, if you approach work as being part of your life, and working to get the important things out of it, it becomes so much more rewarding. For example, I want to volunteer more. Instead of viewing this as something outside of work that I need to make time for, I now work for a company that offers many opportunities to volunteer in the community. It's a bonus at work and in life.

The Bone Clocks, by David Mitchell.  David Mitchell is a fascinating author. I am never sure how to summarize his books, because they are so incredibly complex, but I love them. The Bone Clocks was no exception. It is somewhat similar in structure to Cloud Atlas, in that it is divided into six stories, each told from a different character's point of view. It has an element of the supernatural included, which is interesting and serves to support the theme of mortality, although the climax of that part of the book was the least satisfying for me. The overriding story arch follows the life of one woman, and it was her story that was the most interesting to me.