The Last Lecture

Having read The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch, I decided to see his last lecture video on the Youtube. It is quite awesome, I mean the book does not give as much inspiration as the video does, which is really good. There is not much of sermonising in the video, but lot of examples of what went right for him as a computer scientist. I would' nt rate the book very high, but the book with the video does seem unbeatable.

The Mystery of Capital

Just finished reading "The Mystery of Capital" by Hernando do Soto, a Peruvian economist. do Soto talks about capital in the economic sense as opposed to that of an accountant or a banker. the main theme of the book is property rights and property reform to enable the parallel economy to come overboard and take part in the development process. Basically he postulates giving property rights to squatters so that they are able to obtain bank loans on the basis of mortgages of the property. It does make sense to create capital within the country rather than depend on foreign investment. But the problem is not that simple as it was maybe 200 or so years ago, when land was aplently and it was okay for the politicians to grant squatter rights as was done in the US. India has adopted a novel way of giving squatter rights in that the govt. gives free housing with proper documents to people who have encroached public land before a certain cut off year. There is much heartburn in giving away anything free to people and it does hurt the middle class who have to slog their way out in difficult times.

The theme of the book being capital creation and improvement in the economy is good and undoubtedly examples in the western countries where extreme forms of capitalism thrive (for eg. bundling of mortgage rights in two or three tiers or unheard of rights in commodities and such exotic products as derivatives, options etc.) give credence to the research carried in the subject. The narrative of this book is very poor and de Soto repeats the same thing at many places.

Dreamcatcher

Just finished reading "Dreamcatcher" by Stephen King, the master of the "horror" genre. This one is not exactly horror but more sci-fi. Stephen has infused so much of humour into the narrative that the horror part seems to be passe. He has build in an excellent human interest narrative into this book, almost like a thriller. It is my first one of Stephen King. I think the horror part will come out better in a movie than in the book. This one of 692 pages, I finished in 5 days.

Song of Solomon

Just finished reading "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison, her first for me, a searing portrayal of a search for identity of a tormented black youth from a dysfunctional family. Her narrative is absolutely brilliant as she weaves the story from one family member to another touching upon the troubled past of each person.

The Associate

I just finished reading The Associate by John Grisham, and I must say frankly I am disappointed. He has not given any finishing touch to the story and left it dangling at the end. Its a no-ender. What should have been a "whodunit" becomes a "whthappnd2destory". I will give it a 1 on 5 rating.