The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century by Thomas L. Friedman

The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century
Thomas L. Friedman
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York: 2006)

Expanded and revised version, 2006; original edition, 2005.

READ: January 2007 (unfinished)

All you need to know about this book is summarized thus: Ugh.

For those of you who feel that isn't an adequate review, read on:

I was looking forward to reading this book. It had been recommended to me by a few people, and I kept seeing it at bookstores - even those bookstores that only sell a handful of English-language books. But the fact it was alongside Danielle Steele and Da Vinci's Code* should have tipped me off.

I made it through 300-some pages, so 2/3 of the way through, before I decided enough was enough, that I had much more worthy books on my shelf, and I wasn't going to read it anymore. The problem was, I didn't like the book from about page 5! I was giving Friedman the benefit of the doubt. I thought he might change! Alas, I can be too patient of a reader sometimes.

Friedman is a columnist at the New York Times and I guess his The Lexus and the Olive Tree is considered (by some, at least) to be the definitive work on the Middle East. Well, all I can say is that I hope it is better-researched and more critical than The World is Flat. This book reads like a long, lengthy, never-ending magazine article. And, with all due respect to magazine writers, here we have an incredibly BAD magazine article. He has lengthy quotes from various players in the global market, but they are all CEOs and other people who have already bought into the "flat world" way of thinking. In other words, Friedman seems to have only spoken to people who already agree with his thesis. That just doesn't "do it" for me.

I need to start reading with sticky-tabs handy. There were many sentences and paragraphs that made me snort derisively, and I wish I could find one now to share with you. The amount of times Friedman pointed something out that was either blatantly obvious or blatantly one-sided just made me cringe. What? He's going to spend another 550 pages telling me businesses need to go global, that they can't do it all themselves and remain economically efficient? Tell me something I don't know. Or at least, tell me in a way that could possibly garner some debate. Maybe - here's a radical idea - maybe tell me what an anti-globalization activist thinks of his "flat world" inevitability. How about those countries who have yet been unable to jump onto the globalization bandwagon (for ex., swathes of Africa)? Oh, the world exists only of the United States, India, China and Bangladesh. I see. Am I really supposed to swallow the line that outsourcing American accounting to Indian accountants is good for everyone because now Indian accountants can stay in India and be employed (the fact that the Indian wage is a fraction of the American wage is discussed no further by Friedman other than as a statement of fact) while the American accountant can exercise his true talents of more complicated accounting (ie., rather than just straightening out Friedman's taxes once a year, he can sit down with Friedman and figure out how to best shelter Friedman's income from taxes). How about paying a bit of lip service to the other side of the coin? Isn't that what journalism should be about??? No, Friedman has already written off anyone who doesn't see globalization as the future. And that's just lazy writing, as far as I'm concerned.

If anyone knows a good book on globalization, please let me know. But this sure ain't it. Keep your $17 (what I wasted on it).

* OK, I'm sure Da Vinci's Code is a good book and shouldn't be tossed in with Danielle Steele. But it's just disgustingly everywhere!!!

A Crack in the Edge of the World by Simon Winchester

A Crack in the Edge of the World: The Great American Earthquake of 1906
Simon Winchester
(Penguin Books, London: 2006)

First published by Viking in 2005.

READ: December 2006 - January 2007

There is no need to be an avid earthquake junkie to enjoy this book,* though it would be fair to say a passing interest in natural disasters helps. Former journalist Simon Winchester, who is trained in geology, has written an intensely compelling account of the famous 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

The earthquake was simply devastating. Striking early in the morning on April 18, 1906, it reduced a large part of San Francisco, one of the United States' most vibrant cities, to rubble. And what the earthquake did not destroy, the widespread fires that subsequently broke out finished off. Many thought the city would not be able to rebuild, but within a few months, it was back on its feet.

This is not just a social history of the people of San Francisco, detailing how peoples' lives were interrupted by the earthquake. While that in itself might be interesting enough, it certainly would not be adequate to sustain my interest for ~400 pages. Instead, in addition to bringing the 1906 earthquake and its reluctant participants to vivid life, Winchester also takes us on a fascinating geological tour. To research this book, he in fact traveled from just outside Albany in New York State, and straight across the southern United States to California. He then continued his travels northwards, through British Columbia up to Alaska (which is frequently hit by large quakes), and then back down through the Rockies and across the North American plain to his starting point in New York State. Along the way, he visits some of the most important geological hotspots, and tells us about their most interesting histories. Who knew, for instance, that a little tiny town in Missouri has suffered tens of thousands of earthquakes in the years since it was rocked by some quite violent ones in 1811, and that someday (in another 100 years or so) it will be hit by more big ones? Also, have you ever stopped to think that Yellowstone Park's Old Faithful is really just biding its time before, one day, it will turn into a super-volcano?

Set against the backdrop of the 1906 earthquake itself, Winchester tells us about these quirks of geology, and also takes us on a fascinating tour through the history and world of earthquake science, plate tectonics. This book should be called "Earthquake Science for Dummies (and It's Interesting, Too!)". Winchester knows his subject, and he gives just enough of a personal touch to every part of his subject (throwing in anecdotes, etc.) that what ought to be dry geological theories become quite interesting.

In fact, I suspect Winchester could make the phone book sound interesting.

* Unlike your beloved reviewer.

2007 Booklist

1. A Crack in the Edge of the World by Simon Winchester


2. The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century by Thomas L. Friedman (unfinished)


3. English for Use in "The Way of Tea"


4. The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje


5. Looking for the Lost by Alan Booth


6. Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones (re-read )


7. Mightier Than the Sword by Tom Holt (Book 1: "Who's Afraid of Beowulf?")


8. Wild Grass: China's Revolution from Below by Ian Johnson


9. The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham


10. Vintage Murakami by Haruki Murakami


11. Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez


12. Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden


13. Japan: Its History and Culture by W. Scott Morton and J. Kenneth Olenik


14. Mightier Than the Sword by Tom Holt (Book 2: "My Hero")


15. The Lady and the Monk: Four Seasons in Kyoto by Pico Iyer


16. Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins


17. Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw: Travels in Search of Canada by Will Ferguson


18. Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella


19. Anil's Ghost by Michael Ondaatje


20. Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson


21. Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto


22. Krakatoa: The Day The World Exploded: August 27, 1883 by Simon Winchester


23. The Burma Road by Donovan Webster


24. Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories edited by Roald Dahl


25. JPod by Douglas Coupland


26. Gods of Peace, Gods of War by Russell Bourne


27. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown


28. Obasan by Joy Kogawa


29. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett


30. A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson


31. The Player of Games by Iain M. Banks


32. Hard-to-Answer Questions About Japan by Uchiike Hisataka and Michael Brase


33. Red China Blues: My Long March from Mao to Now by Jan Wong


34. Who Is Frances Rain? by Margaret Buffie

Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

Howl's Moving Castle
Diana Wynne Jones
(Harpertrophy, New York: 2001)

READ: December 2006

I think this was made into a Japanese anime movie not so long ago, by Miyazaki, if I'm not mistaken. Anyway, I'd heard good things about this book, so I figured it would make a good Christmas vacation read. And it did!

Sophie is an ordinary girl destined for ordinariness, when one day, through no error of her own, she runs afoul of the Witch of the Waste, who transforms her into an old woman. So Sophie sets out to seek her fortune, and ends up in the always-moving castle of Howl, a young and unlikeable wizard whose help Sophie has decided to seek. Things become, as they so often do when wizards are involved, most extraordinary.

The tale is quite enchanting, and while a little simple at times (again, targeted for readers much younger than me), I really enjoyed it. It was funny, the characters were decently-developed, and the story touching. A good read.

Things Not Seen by Andrew Clement

Things Not Seen
Andrew Clement
(Penguin Young Reader Group, New York: 2004)

READ: December 2006

This is not the usual kind of book I like to read. I was given the book in September by an American teacher who was at our school for a week as part of a student exchange. Nevertheless, it was good.

Bobby wakes up one morning to find he is invisible. He just isn't there anymore. This, understandably, freaks his parents out. He's a little freaked out, too. His parents don't want to get doctors involved as they fear Bobby will be taken away from them for research purposes, so they set out to do their own investigations. Social services gets involved after Bobby is absent from school for almost two weeks, and many other hijinks ensue. Bobby also makes friends with Alicia, a girl who suddenly went blind about a year earlier, and she also gets involved in trying to figure out how to make Bobby reappear. You can kind of figure out the plot from there.

While the plot is simple, I can see why it's a popular book with its pre-teen target audience (which a quick Internet search indicated). I haven't read enough in the genre to really assess it, but it's kind of entertaining, mildly compelling, and just quirky enough to keep you reading.

The Book of Ikebana by Kawase Toshirou

The Book of Ikebana
Kawase Toshirou
(Kodansha International, Tokyo: 2000)

READ: December 2006

This is partly a how-to book and partly a why-to book. Ikebana is the Japanese art of arranging flowers. Allow me to quote from the book's Foreword - he says it better than I could:

[T]his book discusses flowers in detail from a variety of perspectives as they have been passed down through the generations in the hearts of the Japanese. And to make flower arrangement more enjoyable, it provides easy-to-understand explanations - in both Japanese and English - from the basics of handling flowers to fairly advanced professional techniques, all richly illustrated.

I'm slightly hopeless at arranging flowers. But I've gotten some neat ideas from this book. I also like reading about the culture of flower arranging in Japan.

This book is part of a series of books on Japanese life and culture that are published in bilingual editions by Kodansha International. I plan on picking up a few more before leaving Japan, as I think they're well-written and interesting.

A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes by Stephen Hawking

A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes
Stephen Hawking
(Bantam Press, Great Britain: 1988)

With an introduction by Carl Sagan.

READ: September - December 2006 (intermittent)

This is not a big book (185 pages), but in it, Stephen Hawking covers a massive amount of ground. Starting from the Greeks, and running through Newton all the way to Einstein and beyond, Hawking attempts to outline for us, the non-science-y people, that area of physics that explores questions of time and space and, most importantly, the search for a theory that would explain it all. The meaning of life in one sentence (or rather, since it is physics, one equation).

I won't pretend I even begin to understand everything he talked about (in fact, the truth is far from that), but it is a fascinating read. Though a little tough and dry at times, Hawking generally does a good job of explaining concepts. A piece of advice for those who want to read it: Rather than reading it in dribs and drabs over a few months like I did, read it in as concentrated a period of time as you can. I want to re-read this book again at some point in the next year or so, and do exactly that - I think that way I'll get a better understanding of it.

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Jules Verne
(Puffin Classics: 1995)

First published in French in 1870.

READ: September-November 2006

A 19th-century classic. Through a strange twist of fate, Professor Aronnax and two companions, his man-servant Conseil and a French Canadian (!) harpooner (whaler) called Ned Land, journey to the deepest, darkest depths of the sea with the elusive Captain Nemo on his fantastic submarine, Nautilus. It's a fantastic journey, but the reading is not for those who want their stories told quickly: the Professor is a noted marine biologist, and he wastes no opportunity to minutely detail every creature of the sea that he encounters.

However, the story itself is entertaining, and while I don't know Verne's background (nor have I read anything else by him - an oversight I should correct someday), I admire the level of work and research that must have gone into the writing of this tale. While submarines did exist when Verne wrote this, many of the features of Nautilus were not yet possible, and his imagination has to be admired. Finally, I found the political vision of Captain Nemo, a man who has turned his back on most of mankind, to be fairly un-Victorian, giving the book an interesting resonance for contemporary times (at least for me). Besides, if nothing else, this book was worth reading just to see how the 19th-century French viewed their provincial Canadian cousins.

Lost Japan by Alex Kerr

Lost Japan
Alex Kerr
(Lonely Planet Publications, Australia: 1996)

First published in Japanese in 1993 as Utsukushiki Nippon no Zanzo (Shincho-sha, Tokyo). Translated by the author Alex Kerr in 1996 for the Lonely Planet Journeys series.

READ: November 2006

Along with Alan Booth's books, Lost Japan is lauded pretty much everywhere as one of the best books ever written about Japan.

I agree. I couldn't put it down.

My recommendation: Read this book.

There's really not much more I can say. It's just a wonderful book. Even for those who are not Japanophiles, this book can be appreciated on many levels. Yes, it is about Japan and the Japanese, and was written by a man who has lived most of his adult life in Japan. A memoir of sorts, it is a story about looking for beauty, a beauty whichi happens to exist in Japan but is rapidly disappearing as Japan continues stumbling blindly forward to the future.

As a side-note, this book was originally written in Japanese, and Alex Kerr was the first foreigner to win the prestigious Shincho Gakugei Literary Prize of Japan in 1994 for it.

The Adventure of English: The Biography of a Language by Melvyn Bragg

The Adventure of English: The Biography of a Language
Melvyn Bragg
(Hodder & Stoughton, Great Britain: 2005)

READ: September-November 2006

I kept seeing this book in the English-language section of one of the bookstores in nearby Nagoya, and finally I had to buy it. And man, what a compelling read!

As the title suggests, Melvyn Bragg has set out to give us a history of the English language. But far from being dry and pedantic, he has a humorous, often light-hearted twist on the story. He gives further details where needed, and glosses over other parts of the story when they are not key to the advancement of the telling. (A skill I sorely lack.) The result is a thoroughly entertaining read about an important movement in history - the development and entrenchment of the English language across large swathes of the world.

Obviously, this book is a little Euro- ethnocentric, but, well, it is about the English language specifically (not just language in general), so that's hardly avoidable. While he sometimes explodes into overblown grandeur, overall Bragg does a good job of recognizing his bias (and, indeed, the bias of the language itself).

This book is apparently at least based in part on a television documentary (I think for the BBC) that Bragg did a few years earlier, but that's all I know.