Highlights from
my bookshelf.

Books I love

Books have shaped a lot of who I am. My approach to life, to work, to coaching, to parenting and others are in many ways strongly influenced by thoughtful ideas I learned through books. Ones which changed me in substantial ways are marked with a ★.

If you’d like to discuss any of these or have recommendations, drop me a line.

• Philosophy
• 
  A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic JoyWilliam B. Irvine
• 
  MeditationsMarcus Aurelius
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  On the Shortness of LifeSeneca
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  The Most Good You Can Do: How Effective Altruism Is Changing Ideas About Living EthicallyPeter Singer
• 
  Free WillSam Harris
• 
  LyingSam Harris
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  Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for MortalsOliver Burkeman
• 
  Antifragile: Things That Gain from DisorderNassim Nicholas Taleb
• 
  Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily LifeNassim Nicholas Taleb
• 
  Why Honor MattersTamler Sommers
• 
  Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the EndAtul Gawande
• 
  The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations for Clarity, Effectiveness, and SerenityRyan Holiday
• 
  Relational Mindfulness: A Handbook for Deepening Our Connections with Ourselves, Each Other, and the PlanetDeborah Eden Tull
• 
  Hell Yeah or No: What's Worth DoingDerek Sivers
• 
  The Tao Is SilentRaymond M. Smullyan
• Psychology
• 
  Thinking, Fast and SlowDaniel Kahneman
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  The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient WisdomJonathan Haidt
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  The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and ReligionJonathan Haidt
• 
  Tribe: On Homecoming and BelongingSebastian Junger
• 
  WarSebastian Junger
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  The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical TalesOliver Sacks
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  The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates LanguageSteven Pinker
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  The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental IllnessJonathan Haidt
• Business
• 
  Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It MattersRichard P. Rumelt
• 
  Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers LoveMarty Cagan
• 
  High Output ManagementAndrew S. Grove
• 
  Remote: Office Not RequiredDavid Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried
• 
  Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love ItApril Dunford
• 
  Shape Up: Stop Running in Circles and Ship Work that MattersRyan Singer
• 
  Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth MakingTony Fadell
• 
  The Culture Map: Breaking Through the Invisible Boundaries of Global BusinessErin Meyer
• Economics and Politics
• 
  The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity EvolvesMatt Ridley
• 
  The Economics of InequalityThomas Piketty
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  The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster CapitalismNaomi Klein
• 
  Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist ManifestoStewart Brand
• 
  Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You ThinkHans Rosling
• 
  Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal WorldRutger Bregman
• 
  Permanent RecordEdward Snowden
• 
  Griftopia: Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and the Long Con That Is Breaking AmericaMatt Taibbi
• Faith (lack thereof)
• 
  Moses and MonotheismSigmund Freud
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  The God DelusionRichard Dawkins
• 
  The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of ReasonSam Harris
• 
  Letter to a Christian NationSam Harris
• 
  Parenting Beyond Belief: On Raising Ethical, Caring Kids Without ReligionDale McGowan
• History
• 
  The Lessons of HistoryWill and Ariel Durant
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  A People's History of American EmpireHoward Zinn
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  Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human SocietiesJared Diamond
• 
  Sapiens: A Brief History of HumankindYuval Noah Harari
• 
  Origin Story: A Big History of EverythingDavid Christian
• 
  The Structure of Scientific RevolutionsThomas S. Kuhn
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  The Most Powerful Idea in the World: A Story of Steam, Industry, and InventionWilliam Rosen
• 
  A New World Begins: The History of the French RevolutionJeremy D. Popkin
• 
  Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest StatesJames C. Scott
• 
  Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North KoreaBarbara Demick
• Culture
• 
  Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show BusinessNeil Postman
• 
  The Disappearance of ChildhoodNeil Postman
• 
  The End of Education: Redefining the Value of SchoolNeil Postman
• 
  Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to TechnologyNeil Postman
• 
  The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our BrainsNicholas Carr
• 
  Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media ManipulatorRyan Holiday
• 
  The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass MovementsEric Hoffer
• 
  God, Human, Animal, Machine: Technology, Metaphor, and the Search for MeaningMeghan O'Gieblyn
• Parenting
• 
  The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental IllnessJonathan Haidt
• 
  The Happy Sleeper: The Science-Backed Guide to Helping Your Baby Get a Good Night's Sleep-Newborn to School AgeHeather Turgeon
• 
  Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French ParentingPamela Druckerman
• 
  Achtung Baby: An American Mom on the German Art of Raising Self-Reliant ChildrenSara Zaske
• 
  What's Going On in There? How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of LifeLise Eliot
• 
  How to Tell Stories to Children: And Everyone Else Too Joseph Sarosy and Silke Rose West
• 
  The Montessori Toddler: A Parent's Guide to Raising a Curious and Responsible Human BeingSimone Davies
• 
  Pára de Chatear a Tua Irmã e Deixa o Teu Irmão em Paz!Magda Gomes Dias
• 
  The Emotional Life of the ToddlerAlicia F. Lieberman
• Design
• 
  Understanding ComicsScott McCloud
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  The Art of Looking SidewaysAlan Fletcher
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  The Visual Display of Quantitative InformationEdward R. Tufte
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  The Elements of Typographic StyleRobert Bringhurst
• Other
• 
  Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and DreamsMatthew Walker
• 
  The Body: A Guide for OccupantsBill Bryson
• 
  I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of LifeEd Yong
• 
  Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized WorldDavid Epstein
• 
  Cooked: A Natural History of TransformationMichael Pollan
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  The Little Book of Common Sense Investing: The Only Way to Guarantee Your Fair Share of Stock Market ReturnsJohn C. Bogle
• 
  EducatedTara Westover
• 
  "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character"Richard P. Feynman
• 
  The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard P. FeynmanRichard P. Feynman
• 
  The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian MedicineLindsey Fitzharris
• 
  An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around UsEd Yong
• 
  The Death of Ivan IlyichLeo Tolstoy
• 
  Latim em pó: Um passeio pela formação do nosso portuguêsCaetano W. Galindo