Breakthrough Entrepreneurship by, Jon Burgstone and Bill Murphy Jr.

From Publisher's Weekly:

"Writing with business journalist Murphy, entrepreneurship expert and UC-Berkeley professor Burgstone offers a strong, comprehensive handbook for aspiring entrepreneurs who are seized with the fire of ambition but unsure where to begin. 

The authors detail a step-by step framework for readers to brainstorm a winning business idea, test it before they've committed too much time and money, and develop it into something great. Using examples of companies large and small (Zipcar, Parenting, Wal-Mart, Google), Burgstone and Murphy teach readers to find and fill an unmet customer need, plan for profitability, strive for sustainability, establish credibility, gather necessary resources, lead and manage effectively, and maintain balance. 

Their enthusiasm and energy make even complex questions about idea generation, customer acquisition, and leadership accessible; and the practical, easy to understand instruction will be invaluable to the budding entrepreneur."

Jon Burgstone currently works as a professional investor and professor. Burgstone serves as Managing Director of Symbol Capital, a private investment partnership, and is also appointed as Adjunct Professor of Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. Before Symbol Capital, Burgstone was Founding Faculty Chair at the Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology at the University of California Berkeley's College of Engineering.

Earlier in his career, Burgstone was CEO and co-founder of SupplierMarket, an internet software company serving global enterprises. SupplierMarket was acquired for $1.1B in the late summer of 2000 by Ariba, Inc. and the product is now named Ariba Sourcing. Previously, Burgstone was a high-tech strategy consultant (semiconductor, online financial services and telecom), and he began his career at Ford Motor Co.

Bill Murphy Jr. is an author and journalist in Washington, DC. With Jon Burgstone, he is the coauthor of "Breakthrough Entrepreneurship," which will be available in March 2012. Previously, Murphy wrote the books "The Intelligent Entrepreneur" (now available in paperback and Kindle), and "In a Time of War."

A former trial attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice and an army veteran, Murphy worked as the lead reporting assistant to Bob Woodward of The Washington Post on "State of Denial" and "The Secret Man." He also reported from Iraq for the Post.

He's always looking for the next great thing to write about---so if you have an idea, email him..

Find This Book and Click Here: Breakthrough Entrepreneurship

Gone Girl: A Novel by,Gillian Flynn

Marriage can be a real killer. 
   One of the most critically acclaimed suspense writers of our time, New York Times bestseller Gillian Flynn takes that statement to its darkest place in this unputdownable masterpiece about a marriage gone terribly, terribly wrong. The Chicago Tribune proclaimed that her work “draws you in and keeps you reading with the force of a pure but nasty addiction.” Gone Girl’s toxic mix of sharp-edged wit and deliciously chilling prose creates a nerve-fraying thriller that confounds you at every turn. 

   On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne’s fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick’s clever and beautiful wife disappears from their rented McMansion on the Mississippi River. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn’t doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife’s head, but passages from Amy's diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge. Under mounting pressure from the police and the media—as well as Amy’s fiercely doting parents—the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he’s definitely bitter—but is he really a killer? 

   As the cops close in, every couple in town is soon wondering how well they know the one that they love. With his twin sister, Margo, at his side, Nick stands by his innocence. Trouble is, if Nick didn’t do it, where is that beautiful wife? And what was in that silvery gift box hidden in the back of her bedroom closet?

   With her razor-sharp writing and trademark psychological insight, Gillian Flynn delivers a fast-paced, devilishly dark, and ingeniously plotted thriller that confirms her status as one of the hottest writers around.

The Lies That Buoy, Then Break a Marriage

By JANET MASLIN, The New York Times

Gillian Flynn’s ice-pick-sharp “Gone Girl” begins far too innocently by explaining how Nick and Amy Dunne celebrated their fifth wedding anniversary. Amy got up and started making crepes. Nick came into the kitchen, appreciating his wife’s effort but wondering why Amy was humming the theme song from “M*A*S*H.” You know, that “suicide is painless” thing.

“Well, hello, handsome,” Amy says to her husband.

“Bile and dread inched up my throat,” Nick recalls, although Ms. Flynn’s spectacularly sneaky novel does not explain that, not right away. Anyway, Nick leaves the house after breakfast. He heads to work. While he is gone, Amy disappears into thin air.

It almost requires a game board to show how Nick and Amy move through this book. They met at a party in Brooklyn and were momentarily smitten. (Move one step forward.) Eight months later they connected for real. They got married. (Another step forward.) Then Nick lost his job. (One step back.) So they had to move back to Nick’s hometown, North Carthage, Mo., which Amy hated. (Another step back.) In Missouri they had the kinds of fights, infidelity, money troubles and other noir-style problems that witnesses will remember now that Amy’s gone. (Nick, go to jail.)

Perhaps these sound like standard-issue crime story machinations. They’re not. They’re only the opening moves for the game Ms. Flynn has in mind, which is a two-sided contest in which Nick and Amy tell conflicting stories. Each addresses the reader: Nick in the present tense, and Amy by way of an italics-filled, giddily emotional diary about the marriage. Both Nick and Amy are extremely adept liars, and they lied to each other a lot. Now they will lie to you.

Nick’s narrative begins the book, and it illustrates how many different ways there are to dissemble. Like many a less clever unreliable narrator, Nick likes lies of omission. The reader has to figure this out very gradually, because Ms. Flynn is impressively cagey about which details she chooses to withhold.

But when the police come calling, Nick lies to them outright and even asks for the reader’s sympathy. A guy who recently increased his wife’s life insurance policy? Who has a hot temper? Who has a young and pretty girlfriend he’s been seeing on the sly? Being honest is simply not an option for him.

The invisible Amy can talk only about her past behavior. She began keeping the diary in 2005, and it describes the marriage as an emotional roller coaster. Even when the fights began, Amy went to elaborate efforts to be cheerful and boost her husband’s spirits, but she grew more and more worried as the marriage spiraled downward. Gee, she even reached the point of thinking she needed a gun.

An ordinary writer might think this a fully stocked pond. But Ms. Flynn, a former critic for Entertainment Weekly, is still just warming up. She has many peculiar details to add. Here are some about Amy: She is no ordinary New York girl. She is the daughter of parents who wrote a string of “Amazing Amy” books with an idealized version of their daughter as the heroine. Amy still remembers the stalkers she had as a child.

The books made Amy famous and her family rich. But their emphasis on perfectionism was more than a little creepy. The books even contained quizzes about what Amazing Amy would do under various circumstances, and Amy made up those quizzes herself.

As an adult, she still weirdly gave herself multiple-choice options when she married: Abducted Amy, stuck in North Carthage. North Carthage is right near Hannibal, the home of Mark Twain. (Move one step forward if you see how Tom Sawyer has been worked into “Gone Girl.” And not just because the Dunne house is on the Mississippi River.)

Amy was also either adorable or freaky enough to stage a treasure hunt for each wedding anniversary. One measure of Ms. Flynn’s diabolical finesse is the Rorschach test she has made out of each of Amy’s written clues. We have many chances to examine them before this book is over.

Then there are the potentially troubling things about Nick. He owns a bar with his twin sister. He used Amy’s money to finance the place but resents her for that. He has also taken a teaching job but still fumes about being fired by a magazine in New York. Although his temper does rage at times, he has a charming smile at others. Much to his disadvantage, Nick smiled winningly for the cameras while being questioned by the news media about his lost wife.

And Nick has a secret life that did not involve Amy. On the morning she vanished, he was off doing something that he is deeply ashamed of, and it is not revealed until late in the novel. Ms. Flynn’s idea for Nick’s biggest secret will be, for some readers, the most startling detail in a book that is full of terrific little touches.

“Gone Girl” is this author’s third novel, after “Sharp Objects” and "Dark Places." “Dark Places,” in particular, drew attention from mystery aficionados, but “Gone Girl” is Ms. Flynn’s dazzling breakthrough. It is wily, mercurial, subtly layered and populated by characters so well imagined that they’re hard to part with — even if, as in Amy’s case, they are already departed.

And if you have any doubts about whether Ms. Flynn measures up to Patricia Highsmith’s level of discreet malice, go back and look at the small details. Whatever you raced past on a first reading will look completely different the second time around.

Find This Book and Click Here: Gone Girl: A Novel

Fifty Shades Trilogy

Fifty Shades of Grey, Book One

When literature student Anastasia Steele goes to interview young entrepreneur Christian Grey, she encounters a man who is beautiful, brilliant, and intimidating. The unworldly, innocent Ana is startled to realize she wants this man and, despite his enigmatic reserve, finds she is desperate to get close to him. Unable to resist Ana’s quiet beauty, wit, and independent spirit, Grey admits he wants her, too—but on his own terms.
 
Shocked yet thrilled by Grey’s singular erotic tastes, Ana hesitates. For all the trappings of success—his multinational businesses, his vast wealth, his loving family—Grey is a man tormented by demons and consumed by the need to control. When the couple embarks on a daring, passionately physical affair, Ana discovers Christian Grey’s secrets and explores her own dark desires.

Erotic, amusing, and deeply moving, the Fifty Shades Trilogy is a tale that will obsess you, possess you, and stay with you forever.

This book is intended for mature audiences.

Fifty Shades Darker, Book Two

Daunted by the singular tastes and dark secrets of the beautiful, tormented young entrepreneur Christian Grey, Anastasia Steele has broken off their relationship to start a new career with a Seattle publishing house. 
 
But desire for Christian still dominates her every waking thought, and when he proposes a new arrangement, Anastasia cannot resist. They rekindle their searing sensual affair, and Anastasia learns more about the harrowing past of her damaged, driven and demanding Fifty Shades.
 
While Christian wrestles with his inner demons, Anastasia must confront the anger and envy of the women who came before her, and make the most important decision of her life.

This book is intended for mature audiences.

Fifty Shades Freed, Book Three

When unworldly student Anastasia Steele first encountered the driven and dazzling young entrepreneur Christian Grey it sparked a sensual affair that changed both of their lives irrevocably. Shocked, intrigued, and, ultimately, repelled by Christian’s singular erotic tastes, Ana demands a deeper commitment. Determined to keep her, Christian agrees.
 
Now, Ana and Christian have it all—love, passion, intimacy, wealth, and a world of possibilities for their future. But Ana knows that loving her Fifty Shades will not be easy, and that being together will pose challenges that neither of them would anticipate. Ana must somehow learn to share Christian’s opulent lifestyle without sacrificing her own identity. And Christian must overcome his compulsion to control as he wrestles with the demons of a tormented past.
 
Just when it seems that their strength together will eclipse any obstacle, misfortune, malice, and fate conspire to make Ana’s deepest fears turn to reality.

This book is intended for mature audiences.

Libraries Debate Stocking ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ Trilogy

By. JULIE BOSMAN, The New York Times

It did not escape the notice of Tim Cole, the collections manager for the Greensboro Public Library in North Carolina, that “Fifty Shades of Grey” was “of mixed literary merit,” as he put it with a heavy helping of Southern politeness.

He ordered 21 copies anyway.

His customers had spoken, Mr. Cole said, and like other library officials across the country, he had gotten the message: Readers wanted the “Fifty Shades of Grey” trilogy. In recent weeks they have besieged libraries with requests for the books, signaling a new wave of popularity for these erotic novels, which have become the best-selling titles in the nation this spring.

In some cases demand has been so great that it has forced exasperated library officials to dust off their policies — if they have them — on erotica.

In April the trilogy, which includes the titles “Fifty Shades Darker” and “Fifty Shades Freed,” was issued in paperback by Vintage Books, part of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, sending sales through the roof when the publisher printed and distributed the books widely for the first time.

That enthusiasm has carried over to libraries. At many, “Fifty Shades of Grey,” by the previously unknown British author E. L. James, is the most popular book in circulation, with more holds than anyone can remember on a single title (2,121 and counting last Friday at the Hennepin County Public Library, which includes Minneapolis, up from 942 on April 9).

But despite misgivings about the subject matter — the books tell the tale of a dominant-submissive affair between a manipulative millionaire and a naïve younger woman — library officials feel that they need to make it available.

“This is the ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’ of 2012,” Mr. Cole said. “Demand is a big issue with us, because we want to be able to provide popular best-selling material to our patrons.”

But some libraries have been caught on the other side of the issue. The Brevard County Public Library in east central Florida pulled copies of the books from its shelves after library officials decided they were not appropriate for the public.

“We have criteria that we use, and in this case we view this as pornographic material,” said Don Walker, a spokesman for the Brevard County government.

In Fond du Lac, Wis., the library did not order any copies, saying the books did not meet the standards of the community. In Georgia the Gwinnett County Public Library, near Atlanta, declined to make the books available in its 15 branches, saying that the trilogy’s graphic writing violated its no-erotica policy.

Last week a group of organizations that included the National Coalition Against Censorship formally responded, sending a letter to the library board in Brevard County scolding it for refusing to stock the book alongside standards like “Tropic of Cancer” or “Fear of Flying.”

“There is no rational basis to provide access to erotic novels like these, and at the same time exclude contemporary fiction with similar content,” the letter said. “The very act of rejecting erotica as a category suitable for public libraries sends an unmistakable message of condemnation that is moralistic in tone, and totally inappropriate in a public institution dedicated to serving the needs and interests of all members of the community.”

Joan Bertin, the executive director of the National Coalition Against Censorship, said in an interview that it was unusual for a library to remove a book from its section for adults.

“The vast majority of cases that we deal with have to do with removing books to keep kids from seeing them,” she said. “That’s what makes this so egregious. There are some possible arguments for trying to keep kids away from certain kinds of content, but in the case of adults, other than the restrictions on obscenity and child pornography, there’s simply no excuse. This is really very much against the norms in the profession.”

Vintage, which is part of Random House, said in a statement, “Random House fervently opposes literary censorship and supports the First Amendment rights of readers to make their own reading choices. We believe the Brevard County Public Library System is indulging in an act of censorship, and essentially is saying to library patrons: We will judge what you can read.”

Decisions about which books to stock tend to rest in the hands of local library officials, calculations based on what patrons are asking for and how much money a library system has to spend.

The number of patrons waiting in line for “Fifty Shades of Grey” is extraordinary, higher than the usual demand for the latest John Grisham or Danielle Steel novel, library officials say.

And the line is getting longer every week. At the Cuyahoga County Public Library in Ohio, a system that includes Cleveland, 454 holds were placed on the book in early April; last week there were 1,399.

Robert J. Rua, an official with the Cuyahoga library, said they had bought 539 copies of the trilogy’s first book. There is no section for erotic fiction in the library, he said, so “Fifty Shades” has been placed among the other trade books for adults.

Paul Bogaards, a spokesman for Vintage Books, declined to provide a current sales figure for the trilogy, but said millions had sold so far.

Marcee Challener, the manager of materials and circulation services for the Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Libraries, said that library officials there carefully considered the book before ordering it, but ultimately decided that it was no different from one of the paranormal romances featuring vampires that have been popular for years.

“There’s sex and eroticism in many well-written literary novels,” she said. “It’s part of the human experience.”

But Ken Hall, the library director in Fond du Lac, said he would rather spend precious library funds on books that had literary or artistic value.

Since the library publicly announced that it would not stock the book, he has been hounded by insults, with some people calling him a useless bureaucrat. But he said he had also received numerous compliments from residents urging him not to back down.

“With this type of book, we will get somebody questioning our decision no matter what decision we make,” Mr. Hall said. “We live in an age where people don’t like to talk about gray areas. No pun intended.”

E L James (Author) is a TV executive, wife and mother of two, based in West London. Since early childhood, she dreamt of writing stories that readers would fall in love with, but put those dreams on hold to focus on her family and her career. She finally plucked up the courage to put pen to paper with her first novel, Fifty Shades of Grey.

 

Find This Book and Click Here: Fifty Shades of Grey: Book One of the Fifty Shades Trilogy

Find This Book and Click Here: Fifty Shades Darker: Book Two of the Fifty Shades Trilogy

Find and Click Here: Fifty Shades Freed: Book Three of the Fifty Shades Trilogy (50 Shades Trilogy)

Fifty Shades Trilogy: Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker, Fifty Shades Freed 3-volume Boxed Set

Wonder by.R.J.Palacio

August Pullman was born with a facial deformity that, up until now, has prevented him from going to a mainstream school. Starting 5th grade at Beecher Prep, he wants nothing more than to be treated as an ordinary kid—but his new classmates can’t get past Auggie’s extraordinary face. WONDER, now a New York Times bestseller, begins from Auggie’s point of view, but soon switches to include his classmates, his sister, her boyfriend, and others. These perspectives converge in a portrait of one community’s struggle with empathy, compassion, and acceptance. 

In a world where bullying among young people is an epidemic, this is a refreshing new narrative full of heart and hope. R.J. Palacio has called her debut novel “a meditation on kindness” —indeed, every reader will come away with a greater appreciation for the simple courage of friendship. Auggie is a hero to root for, a diamond in the rough who proves that you can’t blend in when you were born to stand out. 

R.J.Palacio (author)

 “Whatever you’re thinking, it’s probably worse,” he says of his face as the book begins. He’s used to the stares and mean comments, but he’s still terrified to learn that his parents have gotten him into middle school at Beecher Prep and want him to go there rather than be home-schooled. But they persuade him to give it a try — and by the time this rich and memorable first novel by R. J. Palacio is over, it’s not just Auggie but everyone around him who has changed.

Stories about unusual children who long to fit in can be particularly wrenching. At their core lurks a kind of loneliness that stirs primal fears of abandonment and isolation. But Palacio gives Auggie a counterweight to his problems: He has the kind of warm and loving family many “normal” children lack. Among their ­— and the book’s — many strengths, the Pullmans share the, um, earthy sense of humor that all kids love. Over the years his parents, Nate and Isabel, have turned the disturbing story of Auggie’s birth into high comedy involving a flatulent nurse who fainted at the sight of him, and they persuade him to go to Beecher by riffing hilariously on the name of the school’s director, Mr. Tushman. It also helps that the Pullmans’ world — they live in a town house in “the hippie-stroller capital of upper Upper Manhattan” — is the privileged, educated upper-middle class, that hotbed of parents who hover and micromanage the lives of their perfectly fine children. It’s somehow weirdly satisfying to see what happens when something actually alarming enters this zone of needless anxiety. Palacio carves a wise and refreshing path, suggesting that while even a kid like August has to be set free to experience the struggles of life, the right type of closeness between parents and children is a transformative force for good.

But it’s Auggie and the rest of the children who are the real heart of “Wonder,” and Palacio captures the voices of girls and boys, fifth graders and teenagers, with equal skill, switching narrators every few chapters to include Auggie’s friends and his teenage sister, Via, who wrestles with her resentment, guilt and concern. “We circle around him like he’s still the baby he used to be,” she observes ruefully. And we see the vicious politics of fifth-grade popularity played out as the class bully targets Auggie and starts a campaign to shun him, culminating in an overnight school trip that turns scary and shuffles the social deck in ways no one could have imagined.

While I sobbed several times during “Wonder,” my 9-year-old daughter — who loved the book and has been pressing it on her friends — remained dry-eyed. She didn’t understand why I thought Auggie’s situation might upset her. “I like kids who are different,” she said. I realized that what makes her cry are stories in which children suffer because they have missing or neglectful parents and no one to take care of them. Perhaps Palacio’s most remarkable trick is leaving us with the impression that Auggie’s problems are surmountable in all the ways that count — that he is, in fact, in an enviable position.

Maria Russo from The New York Times

Find this book and click here: Wonder

SHINE SHINE SHINE by.Lydia Netzer

When Maxon met Sunny, he was seven years, four months, and eighteen-days old. Or, he was 2693 rotations of the earth old. Maxon was different. Sunny was different. They were different together.

Now, twenty years later, they are married, and Sunny wants, more than anything, to be “normal.” She’s got the housewife thing down perfectly, but Maxon, a genius engineer, is on a NASA mission to the moon, programming robots for a new colony.

 Once they were two outcasts who found unlikely love in each other: a wondrous, strange relationship formed from urgent desire for connection. But now they’re parents to an autistic son. And Sunny is pregnant again. And her mother is dying in the hospital. Their marriage is on the brink of imploding, and they’re at each other’s throats with blame and fear. What exactly has gone wrong?

Sunny wishes Maxon would turn the rocket around and come straight-the-hell home.

When an accident in space puts the mission in peril, everything Sunny and Maxon have built hangs in the balance. Dark secrets, long-forgotten murders, and a blond wig all come tumbling to the light. And nothing will ever be the same.…

A debut of singular power and intelligence, Shine Shine Shine is a unique love story, an adventure between worlds, and a stunning novel of love, death, and what it means to be human.

“Over the moon with a metaphysical spin.  Heart-tugging…it is struggling to understand the physical realities of life and the nature of what makes us human….Nicely unpredictable…Extraordinary.” —Janet Maslin, The New York Times

“Shine Shine Shine” is able to draw readers into its tender, not-quite-human scheme of things because Ms. Netzer treats this as the only reasonable way to look at the world. “Sunny had come up bald from the cradle, and stayed bald throughout her life,” she writes unfussily. “She had been born at some point, and at some point in the future she would die. What happened in between was one long, hairless episode.”

The main story, the part of the book that isn’t fantasy or flashback, is triggered by the end of Sunny’s five-year phase of motherhood and wig wearing. She began wearing hair to make her first child’s life as normal as possible. And “five years in a wig can really make a girl feel blond,” Ms. Netzer writes. But one day Sunny’s minivan flies off course — just as the spaceship carrying Maxon will be thrown off its path to safety.

Lydia Netzer

“Could such a woman ever explain herself?” Ms. Netzer asks about Sunny’s colossal lineup of peculiar problems. Yes, she can. The book offers much to ponder about balancing a coolly mechanistic mind-set with a deep awareness of the precariousness of life. Sunny doesn’t mention any famous song lyrics. But she is steadily focused on the thought that he not busy being born is busy dying.

Had Ms. Netzer approached her material in a more linear fashion, she would have run into credibility problems. But as her Web site acknowledges — complete with a calendar full of scribbled notes about how to fix the novel’s structure — she wound up shuffling parts of her narrative. So “Shine Shine Shine” skips through time in nicely unpredictable fashion. Part is set in Burma, where Sunny is born. Part is about the blossoming of Sunny and Maxon’s childhood friendship. Part is about the college years when Sunny found herself madly attracted to a guy just because the guy had very long hair.

And there’s an extraordinary scene in which Sunny’s mother, then young and vital, disciplines a pony with threats and a baseball bat. “Does the pony like it here?” the mother asks. “Does he like his nice home? Does he enjoy being alive? Does the pony know how lucky he is?” In its own weird way Ms. Netzer’s book asks those questions of us all. —Janet Maslin, The New York Times

 

Find this book and click here: Shine Shine Shine