The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

An enjoyable novel, easy to read, and well written that walks you through several personal stories that are intertwined on the central story of Jonathan Alkaitis, a fund manager that successfully ran a Ponzi Scheme for several decades, until it blew-up in the 2008 great recession (the latter inspired on Bernie Madoff story).

A good book to make your mind relax and enjoy a couple of hours of a dynamic and alluring, but simple, reading.

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Review: Gambling with Other People’s Money: How Perverse Incentives Caused the Financial Crisis

Gambling with Other People’s Money: How Perverse Incentives Caused the Financial Crisis by Russ Roberts
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A great Essay/Book (<100 pages) with a different and sound perspective on the root-causes of the financial 2008 crisis.

I really liked the clarity, rhythm and conciseness of the arguments, presenting them in a simple and to the point approach, instead of prolonging them to exhaustion as some authors do without any added- value.

Do recommend its reading!


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Review: The Slaughterman’s Daughter: The Avenging of Mende Speismann at the Hands of Her Sister Fanny

The Slaughterman’s Daughter: The Avenging of Mende Speismann at the Hands of Her Sister Fanny by Yaniv Iczkovits
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

A romance that was recommended in a 2020 reading list (from the Economist if not mistaken) that I found relative interesting.

The book navigates the reader in several different related and character based stories that then converge in 1 and has the merit to portray an era, reality and the diverse social classes, based on religion/ status/education/national diversity, on the Czar's Russia empire that I was far from familiar.

After reading it I can recognize the merits of the book, but it is far from being on my curated reading list.

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Review: Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy

Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy by Cathy O'Neil
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

An actual, important and insightful book that everyone should read, but should be mandatory for every data practitioners, managers and decision/policy makers.

It provides several examples whereby mathematical/statistics models can go wary and produce outcomes significantly different from the ones original sought and create or reinforce bias, perpetuate trends, reinforce segregation and produce pure bad results and behaviors.

And all this happens while most of the times the models were created with the best intention, of course there are also the cases that some were created to generate and exploit systematical the debilities of specific groups or individuals.

My key takeaways of the book to address most of the identified problems are:
- all models are simplifications of complex realities (full stop);
- when creating a model one should be cognizant of the previous, thus adapt and embrace that it will not be able to address all the variables, so trade-offs have to be made, but those should be made explicit;
- the variables and trade-offs should be made by its relative importance and not because they are quantitively available and make the model work better from an statistical/econometric perspective;
- the models should not be black boxes and transparency should be granted to all the ones that are using it (the user have the right to know);
- the models should be continuously monitored and adapted to the new realities;
- the outcomes and the impact of the model should also be assessed on a systematically way, to ensure there are no unintended consequences of its use.

I'm still a strong believer that these models when properly applied are of great value to underpin the human development, but they can really become WMD if not understood, controlled and monitored by the experts and by the society as all (through regulators, policies in place and by the individuals).

However, there should always be an ethical commitment by the ones who are creating them, this community cannot be neutral to what they are creating.

I feel on my day-to-day work that the model creators do not like to share and are unwilling to share their work with the others (within the society or organization) and that has to change dramatically. The mathematicians, statisticians and data-scientist have to develop their communication skills to be able to explain the models created to any audience they face (not the other way around). If you cannot explain it in 5 minutes and easily is because you do not know it thoroughly!

Regarding the book i think it emphasizes too much on the examples of WMD (after 4/5 the reader gets the point the author is trying to make) and does not focus sufficiently on the potential solutions for the problems presented.

Do recommend its reading.


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Review: International Business Communication Standards: Conceptual, Perceptual, and Semantic Design of Comprehensible Business Reports, Presentations, and Dashboards

International Business Communication Standards: Conceptual, Perceptual, and Semantic Design of Comprehensible Business Reports, Presentations, and Dashboards by Rolf Hichert
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A great small hand(y)book on how to create, develop and present business reports.

It lays-out a set of simple and thorough standards on business communication, also covering the necessary and required theory to frame the main concepts (it also guides you where to find more fundamental knowledge if you find appropriate).

It's really an hands-on book with lots of examples, suggestions and tips that you can immediately apply to your reports, some simple and other more elaborated but all grounded in key simple and valuable principles.

Made me think critically on several reports I'm using and will definitely promote some changes based on this insights and knowledge i got while reading it. Will have it by my side every time i will be creating or reviewing a business report and whatever business communication.

A spillover of the reading this book, is that I have decided to reread the book "The Pyramid Principle", it's been a while that i did it and refresher will be helpful.

Strongly recommend its reading to all interested on this subject.  

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Review: The First Cell: And the Human Costs of Pursuing Cancer to the Last

The First Cell: And the Human Costs of Pursuing Cancer to the Last by Azra Raza
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Decided to read this book after listening to the Author on an Econtalk podcast.

There was something on how Azra Raza explained the key message of the book and the humanity conveyed in such discussion that immediately "magnated" me into reading it.

A disturbing book about cancer, its impact on the lives of those who have to deal with it (on the first person or related family and friends), that more than once made me stop, take a deep breath and reflect, before i could continue.

The key message presented, that the cancer research and associated mainstream treatment (slash, poison and burn) did do not evolve that much in the last 50 years, adheres to reality and that the proposed paradigm shift that she proposes looks also so well grounded. balanced and logic that it seems strange that the proposed approach (to detect the first cell instead of treating millions of them after it is widespread) does not have more interest, momentum and investment.

Sometime it seems that, once again, it's a question of an incorrect incentives and rewards system put in place, that does not allow to make tangible progress on this important subject.

Regarding the author, an oncologist, that experienced all the portrayed stories being an active participant in each of them, you can feel the humanity, empathy, care, frustration and sense impotence she experience with each.

Strongly recommend its reading to all interested in the subject.


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Review: Written in History: Letters that Changed the World

Written in History: Letters that Changed the World by Simon Sebag Montefiore
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Started this books with great expectations after listening to an Intelligence Squared podcast about it.

It was probably due to this high expectations that I gave only a rating of 3/5 starts.

The book discloses several letters throughout history and explains the context when they were written in an interesting and some times compelling way.

Nonetheless, only an handful of them provide credit to the title of the book, others have some historic interest but just that and others looked more like personal life anecdotes of illustrious historic figures.

Saying that, the time reading was short, well spent and light-spirited.

However, before starting it you should consider the opportunity cost of such decision (i.e. have in mind other books you might want to read first)

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