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Tom Gardner, who founded The Motley Fool investing forum (www.fool.com/) with his brother David, is working on his second book, You Have More Than You Think.
Downsize Your Debt: How to Take Control of Your Personal Finances, by Andrew Feinberg. "This is a personal-finance guide to managing your debt: how to pay it down, and renegotiating with creditors. The Web potential of this book is huge. For instance, credit card rates have risen to 18.5 percent, but only high-risk borrowers should be paying that rate. Online, people would be able to share experiences and get advice. Companies won't be able to benefit from customers' ignorance."
How to Drive Your Competition Crazy: Creating Disruption for Fun and Profit, by Guy Kawasaki with Michele Moreno. "We think of this book as incredibly foolish. Kawasaki argues that companies should focus on serving their customers rather than on what their competition is doing. Though he is an Apple Fellow, that company has not been applying his approach. Ironically, his message is exemplified by Microsoft, which persistently asks its customers what they want and tries to improve its products for the average person."
Philippe Kahn, *of Borland International fame, cofounded Starfish Software in 1994 and lives in California's Santa Cruz Mountains.*Music scores. "I play jazz. It's my form of meditation, a workout for the soul. So I listen to a lot of jazz and transcribe and play along. Trane and Bird are the masters. Hearing their solos is better than reading a book - it's instant poetry. On my nightstand, I have a reprint of Johann Sebastian Bach's original score for The Art of Fugue. I love to see his handwriting and hear the music in my head. It's magical. It's as if he sent me a personal note."
One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel García Márquez. "I first read it in French. When I came to the US I tried it in English, which prompted me to reread the French version. And now I'm trying - for the second time - to read it in Spanish. It's a different experience every time. I should have started with Spanish, though. In its original the language sounds like flamenco - passionate and imaginative and full of mystical energy."
Allen Whitman plays bass for The Mermen, cowrites a column in EQ magazine, and makes a great spaghetti sauce.
Pharmako/poeia: Plant Powers, Poisons, and Herbcraft, by Dale Pendell."The book is written for the modern-day alchemist; it combines the heart and the mind, science and the soul. Pendell writes beautifully and has the facts to back up his ideas. This is one of the best and most useful books I have ever read. It helped me quit smoking."
Anything by Salman Rushdie. "Arguably one of the greatest literary geniuses alive today. Certainly one of the best storytellers. Rushdie is absolutely brilliant and very funny; his social commentary and observations of the human condition are written with a sense of humor. My favorite is The Satanic Verses, though I'm slightly embarrassed to admit it. I haven't read The Moor's Last Sigh yet. I'm waiting for the right time. To me, a good book is a banquet - it fills me the way a great meal does. A great book should be savored like a box of chocolates."
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Breeding the MachineListen hear
README On the bookshelves of the digerati
