Author: Allen Cheng

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine takes us inside the madness, corruption, and greed at the heart of the 2007-2008 financial crisis. It tells the story of an eccentric collection of investors who saw the folly of the subprime mortgage-backed securities market—and found a way to bet against it. By focusing on individuals who saw these worthless securities for what they truly were, The Big Short explores the complexities and irrationalities of modern capitalism and forces us to seriously question the wisdom (and motivations) of the financial elites who wield so much power over our economy, society, and politics.

Do you want to learn to get more out of the novels you read? Are you interested in learning how authors communicate through literary devices like symbols, archetypes, and allusions?  How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster is a crash course in the art of reading intelligently. In this book, you’ll learn how to identify common literary conventions and gain the skills necessary to analyze them like a professor would.  In this book, you’ll discover why Goose had to die in Top Gun and why sex scenes aren’t always about sex in literature. 

The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University, is a distillation of his life lessons and experiences. Written with reporter Jeffrey Zaslow, the best-selling book is an expanded version of a “Last Lecture” Pausch gave in 2007, after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. The “Last Lecture” series was a tradition in which professors presented their philosophy of life, as if it were their last chance to share what was important to them. It truly was a last chance for Pausch, who had only months to live. His book and lecture, which went viral and

Successful victory during conflict requires more than just cunning and brawn. Whether you are involved in an individual conflict or are leading a group of people through a competition, the strategies required to prepare for and engage in battle are the same. The Art of War by ancient Chinese warrior and philosopher Sun Tzu provides the essential elements that must be considered to develop strategic conflict resolution tactics. Sun Tzu’s principles guide you through the steps required to become a competent leader and fighter. They also teach you how to determine victory, when to engage in combat, and when to

The Hero With a Thousand Faces explores the common themes and story elements that define the world’s mythologies—the hero’s journey. Through the cycle of initiation, separation, and return, the hero undergoes great trials and tribulations, experiences death and rebirth, and gains new powers that enable mankind’s ultimate redemption. Far from being obsolete relics from long-extinguished civilizations, the myths of the ancients have profound lessons for today’s reader. By studying the struggles, transformations, and redemptions of the great heroes, we come closer to discovering the universal truths of the human condition and unlocking the divine potential that lies inside us all.

The Other Wes Moore chronicles the lives of two men with the same name. Both Wes Moores are black men who grew up in the inner-city communities of Baltimore City and the Bronx. Both were raised by single mothers within the same era. So, how did one end up a decorated military veteran and academic scholar and the other a convicted murder with a life sentence? The book, written by Wes Moore the Army veteran, searches for answers by parsing their histories. He formed a relationship with the other Wes Moore to try to understand when and why their paths

In the 21st century, we can do extraordinary things: we can predict dangerous storms, explore distant planets, and save people from life-threatening conditions and injuries. Yet highly trained, experienced, and capable people regularly make avoidable mistakes.  In The Checklist Manifesto, Boston surgeon Atul Gawande contends the reason is that knowledge and complexity in many fields have exceeded the capacity of any individual to get everything right. Under pressure, we make simple mistakes and overlook the obvious. Drawing lessons from spectacular successes and failures in recent years, he argues that the solution is a checklist. While not a how-to manual, his

Want to learn the ideas in The Things They Carried better than ever? Read the world’s #1 book summary of The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien here. Read a brief 1-Page Summary or watch video summaries curated by our expert team. Note: this book guide is not affiliated with or endorsed by the publisher or author, and we always encourage you to purchase and read the full book. Video Summaries of The Things They Carried We’ve scoured the Internet for the very best videos on The Things They Carried, from high-quality videos summaries to interviews or commentary by Tim

In Sapiens, Yuval Noah Harari uses concepts from biology, history, and economics to tell the story of us, Homo sapiens. Harari takes us on a journey that starts 2.5 million years ago, when Sapiens make their historical entrance, and ends in the future, when the creation of an artificially created superhuman race may mark the end of the Sapiens species. Along the way, we learn how our ability to create imagined realities led to our dominance over other species. We watch as the Agricultural Revolution, the Scientific Revolution, imperialism, capitalism, and the Industrial Revolution change our species in lasting, and not always positive, ways. 

Ultimately, we’re left with one question: As we design our future, who do we want to become? Harari doesn’t give an opinion. Rather, he shows us that asking the right questions may be more important than finding the right answers.

Read this summary to explore our history as a species—in doing so, you’ll see today’s world in an entirely new way.

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis examines the spiritual and social decline of the Appalachian white working class through the life story of its author, JD Vance. Growing up in a post-industrial Ohio town, Vance encountered the symptoms of community and familial dysfunction—drug and alcohol abuse, unstable marriages, lack of education, and evasion of hard work—that underscore the failing values of the culture from which he came. 

Although Vance eventually escapes the poverty and dysfunction of his roots, attending college and Yale Law School, he finds that even economic mobility can never permanently erase the social markers of his hillbilly upbringing.