Recommended Books

1. "The Mexican Dream Or,The Interrupted Thought of Amerindian Civilizations," by J.M.G. Le Clezio. Nobel Prize winning author focuses on the religion and culture of the Aztecs and other pre-Columbian civilizations and the impact of the Spanish conquest. Fascinating use of early source material.
2. "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle," by David Wroblewski." A most entertaining novel by this first time novelist. He is an engaging storyteller. I felt like I was seeing events through the eyes of Edgar's dogs.
3.  "The Decline and Fall Of The Roman Empire," by Edward Gibbon (edited, abridged by Hans-Friedrich Mueller.) I read it while visiting parts of the Eastern Roman Empire and thinking about what a great civilization can do to undermine itself. The book covers the Roman Empire from the second century of the Christian Era till the very last vestiges of Roman civilization in the fifteenth century.
4. "The Namesake," by Jhumpa Lahiri. Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about a family living in multiple cultures.
5. "Driving Results Through Social Networks," by Rob Cross and Robert J. Thomas. Discusses the application of Social Network Analysis in organizations.
6. "Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything," by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams. An interesting journey exploring the application of Web 2.0 technology to various models by which work is done.
7. "Jerusalem 1913: The Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict," by Amy Dockser Marcus. Pulitzer Prize author looks back to the time of Turkish rule when Arabs and Jews in Jerusalem lived side by side in peace and traces events up to the present.
8. "Onitsha," by J.M.G. Le Clezio. The book traces a number of journeys. The one of the mother and young son to Africa to be with her husband from whom she was separated because of war. The journey of the husband to find the site of a displaced civilization. Linear journeys become supplanted by non-linear, mythological ones. LeClezio's highly descriptive language and modulating tempo moves the reader through the languor of ocean crossings and river passages. 
9. "The Prospector," by J.M.G. Le Clezio. I seem to be reading my way through Le Clezio's works or at least those now translated into English from the original French. Each one of Le Clezio's novels is a unique gem and a wonderful adventure in reading and also in exploring the world. This book starts out on the island of Mauritius and then follows the main character on sea voyages and on internal and external explorations in different locales. Le Clezio's powers of description are consistently wonderful. I can easily see each scene in my mind as the story unfolds. As a sailor, I was particularly delighted by the long stretches of the book that described the life and interaction with nature on the sailing voyages. What is unique about Le Clezio's writing is how anchored he is in the concrete elements of nature and actions of his characters and how he integrates this with the inner, existential searches of his characters.
10. "Grown Up Digital," by Don Tapscott. Tapscott looks at the Millennial Generation which he calls "NetGen" which encompasses those born between 1977 to 1997 and their use of Web 2.0. He sets out NetGen norms, like collaboration which reflects their approach to work and the world arising out of their use of the Web and its interactivity from an early age. He then applies these norms to various arenas, e.g. NetGen as Learners, in the Workforce, as Consumers and in the family. One fascinating perspective of Tapscott's is how the NetGen brain is hardwired because of their long-term use of video games in adolescence which provides them with skills such as the ability to process-fast moving images quicker than their parents.
11. "The Cluetrain Manifesto," by Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger. This book has been around for a while though I have just recently read it. Even from the perspective of the year 2000, they are prescient in terms of the potential of the interactive Web (which is now referred to as Web 2.0) to change the top down, command and control approach of corporations in doing business, including how they go about marketing. This change he sees as mainly fomented by the hyperlink capability of the Web. They see the Internet as a place that facilitates knowledge markets and conversations and provides a place where these can occur. He sees conversations as the basis of work and life on the Internet.
12. "The World Cafe: Shaping Our Futures Through Conversations That Matter" by Juanita Brown and David Isaacs. Juanita and David both well known for their work in furthering the practice of Dialogue and Strategic Dialogue take the logical next step which is to add to the development of a vehicle which enables groups of people to more easily be in constructive Dialogue with one another. This vehicle is known as The World Cafe (or in other places by other names such as The Knowledge Cafe). They provide a number of stories and practice points to illustrate the vehicle of the World Cafe and to demonstrate its value.
13. "Tribal Leadership" by Dave Logan, John King, and Halee Fischer-Wright. This books sets out that there are 5 cultural stages at which an organization can be. These stages are manifest in the language that people use which in turn reflects their mood. Stage 1 starts out as Depairing Hostility and the language used revolves around "Life sucks" The stages progress towards greater personal empowerment as in Stage 3 where the mood is of a Lone Warrior and the language revolves around "I'm great and you're not" to Stage 5 which is not only "we" oriented but in service of a larger goal. The book provides some easy to use ways of intervening to move oneself or a group to the next stage.
14. "Passion At Work: Blogging Practices OF Knowledge Workers" PhD dissertation by Lilia Efimova, Novay, Enchede, The Netherlands, 2009. Explores the practices of current bloggers and derives a great deal of insights. Approaches this from mainly from the perspective of the individual blogger, but also discusses how conversations exist across blogs and the uses of blogging in an enterprise.
15. "Fear and Trembling" by Soren Kierkegaard trans. Alastair Hannay. A philosophical-poetic exploration of the sacrifice of Isaac particularly exploring the nature of faith. Not for the faint hearted.
16. "For Whom The Bell Tolls" by Ernest Heningway. A tale of the Spanish Civil War. I felt like I was really there.
17. "The Sun Also Rises" by Ernest Heningway. Life in the post-World War I generation. I never thought a group of people could drink so much - even in a book. 

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