Turn Right At Machu Picchu

Synopsis
Mark Adams spends his midlife crisis trekking through Peru and recounting the explorations of Hiram Bingham, the first Westerner to see Machu Picchu.

My thoughts
I'm a little weary of the whole subgenre of "bored well-to-to Westerner quits his day job and jets off to find himself in a foreign country" travel writing. I couldn't bring myself to finish Under the Tuscan Sun, and I haven't even picked up Eat, Love, Pray. But when it's done right, it's really a joy to read, and my friend Sarah loved this book (yes, I'm linking to it even though Sarah is the only one who actually reads this blog). Adams isn't as superb as Bill Bryson, but this is still a worthwhile read.

Adams is good at what he does. I haven't been to Machu Picchu, but Adams is at his finest when he's describing his experiences there. But the book does slow down when he detours to the early twentieth century to describe American explorer Hiram Bingham's "discovery" of Machu Picchu. The backstory is interesting and I didn't know it, but it sounds all too familiar—Western explorer stumbles onto ruins the locals have always known about and announces his discovery to much fanfare.

Bottom line
This made me want to see Machu Picchu for myself.

Fine print
Turn Right at Machu Picchu, by Mark Adams
Genre: travel, memoir
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library.

Dreams from My Father

Synopsis
Written before he launched his political career, Barack Obama describes his early life in Hawaii and Indonesia, his college career, and his days as a community organizer in Chicago - all influenced by the dreams of the father he never really knew.

My thoughts
I'm generally leery of political biographies or books by politicians in general, but I was interested in Dreams from My Father because it was written before Obama was elected to public office. I figured that meant it wouldn't be skewed by a political agenda. I'm glad I read it because it's a very honest, thoughtful book about a young man finding his place in the world and confronting some of the most divisive aspects of life in the United States.

Obama had a unique childhood. He was born in Hawaii to a white American mother and a black Kenyan father. His parents divorced when he was young and his father pursued a doctorate at Harvard before returning to Kenya. His mother stayed in Hawaii before moving with her son to Indonesia. Obama returned to Hawaii to attend Punahou, the top private school in the state. From there he decided to attend Occidental College in California and pursued an office career for a while before he pursued his impulse to change the world by becoming a community organizer. Throughout his childhood and young adulthood, Obama struggled with his identity, and the book closes with his poignant trip to Kenya to visit his father's family.

It's an amazing journey, one that makes his subsequent career from community organizer to president of the United States almost mundane by comparison.

Bottom line
This is an important book to read if you want to learn more about Barack Obama, American race relations, or white colonialism in Africa.

Fine print
Dreams from My Father, by Barack Obama
Genre: memoir
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book as a birthday present for myself ... in 2008 (and I just got around to reading it).

Steve Jobs

Synopsis
A thorough biography of Apple's mercurial co-founder, savior, and legend.

My thoughts
This biography was hugely entertaining and full of information. Not only did Steve Jobs live an epic life, but Walter Isaacson interviewed practically everyone Jobs ever met to research this book. Isaacson knows how to skillfully sift through all the gossip and other noise to present a well-rounded portrait of his subject. That said, he wasn't able to remain completely impartial. It's almost like he was in awe of Jobs (not that I blame him).

This is certainly a warts-and-all profile, and I came away with the impression that Jobs was a brilliant man but not someone I'd want to work for. He was stubborn, ambitious, and egotistical, and although those qualities translated into enormous success in the business world, they also pushed some of his co-workers and subordinates to the breaking point. It's ironic that these qualities also contributed to his early death. When Jobs was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, he initially chose not to follow his doctors' advice. Defying authority and thumbing his nose at conventional advice had worked spectacularly in his professional life, but it had devastating consequences for his health.

One of the small pleasures of this book was that it gave me the thrill of discovering the inside story to many of the technological innovations that I take for granted. Jobs's magnetic personality inspired his subordinates and spurred them to come up with solutions to problems most people wouldn't even have realized existed. The revolutionary scrolling wheel on the first iPod was one such example. It's a relatively simple idea, but it elegantly streamlined the process of scrolling through a long list of songs on a small screen.

The book also made me appreciate Jobs's (and Apple's) dedication to aesthetics. He understood exactly what technology people wanted (a personal computer, a tablet computer, a multipurpose phone/music player/video game console), and he cared what it looked like. "It's in Apple's DNA that technology alone is not enough," he explained when he introduced the iPad 2. "It's technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the results that make our hearts sing." Jobs could give people what they didn't even know they wanted because he had a passion for the entire product, not just one aspect of it. That's an incredibly rare trait.

Bottom line
Compulsively readable.

Fine print
Steve Jobs, by Walter Isaacson
Genre: biography
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from my library.