Book Summaries

Want to get the main points of Too Big to Fail in 20 minutes or less? Read the world’s #1 book summary of Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin here.

 Too Big to Fail is a detailed account of the personalities and decisions that led to the 2008 financial crisis and how the economy was propped up. Andrew Sorkin has compiled a number of insightful primary sources from the major players that allows us to get a glimpse of the backroom warnings, arguments, and deals in that turbulent time. The choices these key players made led to a major impact on outcome of the 2008 crisis.

When you want to make a change, you come up with a strategy. That’s the easy part—next you have to figure out how to _implement_ the strategy. _The 4 Disciplines of Execution_ harnesses and hones four disciplines that, when properly and specifically applied, allow you to carry out your strategy. When you make use of 1) focus, 2) leverage, 3) engagement, and 4) accountability, not only will you execute your strategies, you’ll create permanent behavioral change and increase engagement.

Make your bed to start your day off right. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? But the simple act of making your bed has bigger implications for your life than you may think. Former Navy SEAL William H. McRaven teaches you how this menial task leads to big rewards in his book, _Make Your Bed_. Using advice he gave graduating college students during a commencement address, McRaven develops 10 lessons for life learned during his time as a SEAL. Follow these lessons to lead a more meaningful life, and you just might change the world in the process.

The Ebola virus is greatly feared, but not well understood. Ebola virus has appeared only a handful of times and, despite being highly infectious, it has never spread to become a full-blown epidemic. However, **Ebola’s brutal attack on victims’ bodies, astronomical kill rates, and ability to mutate make it a constant potential threat. **

_The Hot Zone_ explores how Ebola and its family of viruses affect humans, the history of known outbreaks, and the possibility of a future epidemic.

In_ Amusing Ourselves to Death_, Neil Postman argued presciently 35 years ago that television was reshaping our culture and trivializing public life—news, politics, religion, education, and business—by turning it into entertainment. He warned that we would become so inundated with irrelevant information that we’d lose sight of what was important—even worse, we wouldn’t care as long as we felt entertained. With the proliferation of digital media today and worries about excessive “screen time,” his analysis still resonates.

_Fun Home_ is a graphic memoir by cartoonist Alison Bechdel. It follows Alison through the early years of her life as she navigates her relationship with her closeted father, discovers her own sexuality, and grapples with her father’s supposed suicide. Told in a non-linear fashion, **the book touches on the themes of gender identity, sexual orientation, dysfunctional households, suicide, and literature as a way of connecting to life.**

A _New York Times_ best-seller, _Fun Home _has been acclaimed for its discussion about the topic of intergenerational homosexuality and its innovative approach to the genres of both comics and memoirs.

The election of Donald Trump has sparked a great deal of discussion about the fate of American democracy. _How Democracies Die_ explores some key questions that have become paramount in the Trump era. Does the election of a figure like Trump—an inexperienced outsider with obvious authoritarian instincts—suggest that democracy in the US is backsliding? Are we doomed to suffer the fate of other 21st-century democracies, like Hungary, Venezuela, and Turkey, where true democracy ceased to exist? By what processes was democracy killed in those and other countries—and how might we prevent it here?

Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is your ability to recognize your emotions, recognize the emotions of others, and use this awareness to develop your behavior and relationships. **It’s also one of the defining characteristics of success in the workplace.**

_Emotional Intelligence 2.0_ helps you build your EQ skills through the development of four key pillars: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. These pillars will help you process your emotions, manage your triggers, develop healthy habits, and succeed in your career path.

Although people spend their entire lives learning, most of them are doing it wrong. Strategies like rereading and drilling a skill over and over to commit it to memory take a lot of time and ultimately don’t work.

_Make It Stick_ teaches you the strategies that help you achieve **the two primary goals of learning: To _understand_ and _remember_ what you learn so you can use your knowledge in future situations.** In this summary, learn how a little forgetting helps you remember, and why you’re not a good judge of how much you know.

_Traction_ offers a helping hand for beginning entrepreneurs and others whose businesses are stuck at a point where hard work and determination are no longer enough for them to survive and grow. Business owner and consultant Gino Wickman explains how to structure your business using his Entrepreneurial Operating System to remove typical frustrations, so it regains momentum, it runs seamlessly, and you don’t get mired in details. The system is based on practical experience, not theory. Numerous tools and templates lead business owners step by step through processes to create a structure and core focus that strengthen and reenergize their organizations.