I just picked up a book called Your Portable Empire: How to Make Money Anywhere While Doing What You Love, by Pat O’Bryan.

Not sure if it’s any good yet, but I do know this . . . O’Bryan has some great chapter names in the thing, which drew me in to begin with.  Here are a few chapter titles: Read more »

Popularity: 24% [?]

I’ve read a gazillion books, many on jobs, careers, success, and self-help.

I only include the cream of the cream, the best of the best, the Top 5ers of my world in the Dream Job Dialog Bookshop.

Check ‘er out; I don’t think you’ll be disappointed with anything on the list.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Barbara Sher has been writing and speaking, elegantly and inspirationally, about living your dream-job life longer than just about anyone I know.

I’ve devoured just about everything she’s ever written, and her words ring true.

I’ll do more complete reviews of some of her classic books down the road, but for now I simply wanted to encourage you to get to know her and her work.

While you could pick up any of her books and be the better for it within a few reading sessions, I suggest you start with one of these three books, then work on from there:

Wishcraft, about getting the life you really want.

Refuse to Choose, about having a multi-part (portfolio) career and life, pursuing many of your interests.

I Could Do Anything If I Only Knew What It Was, about self-discovery.

These are truly change-your-life kind of books.

Check ‘er out, a genuine Top 5er.

Popularity: 12% [?]

Books are a big deal to me. Not only do I read for enjoyment, but I find that the bulk of my own self-education and lifelong learning comes from books.

What do books mean to you, and have you read anything great in 2006 that changed your life or made a difference in some aspect of it?

For me, 2006 was a big year that I got back into historical fiction. I especially like good yarns about 20th-century Europe and am a real sucker for anything to do with things that happen to real people during World War II (not the battle stuff, just real, gritty in-your-face life as a citizen during that grizzly era).

So, it was an incredible thrill for me to have discovered William Boyd. While all of his novels aren’t about Europe (one of my favorites is actually A Good Man in Africa, about a mid-level diplomat in an out-of-the-way African country in the early post-colonial period), my favorite Boyd is — Any Human Heart.

If you love great fiction, good story lines, and sweeping 20th century stuff, this is a great place to start. I’ve put Any Human Heart into my Top 5er list.

Over and out,

Michael Werner

Popularity: 13% [?]

I’m a pretty serious, and often intense, reader.

Sometimes I think it’s almost a disease — this fascination with all things books, writing, and publishing.  I’m that guy you see who picks up a magazine (on any topic!) while standing in the checkout line . . . just to have something to read.  I’ll read the backs of laundry pick-up slips while waiting in a drop-off line or the “How To Prepare Your Package for International Shipment” poster while in the post-office queue.

I read fiction (historical fiction, mostly European-related, mysteries, espionage, and literature) and non-fiction (business, how-to, current events) alike.

So, yeah, I read a lot, but I also go in spurts.

I can read three books in three days and then not read anything for a month.

But, when I get the hunger and just gotta have a new book in front of me, I can get pretty desperate.  I’ll walk around the bookstore for an hour or two and, if nothing seems to hit me, I’ll prowl the library . . . if nothing still works, I can get pretty kick-the-dog kind of edgy.

I’d recently been going through one of these can’t-find-a-book-to-save-my-life phases, when an author’s name jumped out at me from the Borders’ bookshelf — the writer is William Boyd and he can, quite simply, write the pants off of just about anyone else.  I’d kind of forgotten about him (having not read any of his stuff for a couple of years), but I almost wet my pants when I realized he has a new book out.

So, really, if you like great fiction — I wouldn’t really classify his stuff as historical fiction, but he does do sweeping across the 20th-century-Euro-themes a lot — grab this guy’s stuff.

His newest book (great, but not my favorite) is Restless, a two-in-one story about a daughter and a mother who’s not all she appears to be.  Great writing, great story line (contemporary and pre-WWII Europe), and just a fine piece of storytelling.

And, if you’re intrigued with this writer, know that his Any Human Heart is definitely a Top5er in my book, and might even be the single best thing I’ve read in the last 10 years.

Not far behind Any Human Heart is The New Confessions, which is also on my Top5er list.

All William Boyd stuff is really worth spending some time with.

Fortunately, I’ve recently (well, what took me so long, I don’t know!) developed a system whereby I stock up with books so that I’ll always have something on the shelf in my times of need.  The shelf is bulging with a pile-o-goodies right now, so I’m a smiling-and-reading fool at the moment.

Popularity: 15% [?]

100 Bullshit Jobs and How To Get Them

Well, as a publisher and author, I always love a good title, and this one sure hit the spot for me.

Don’t know the book (yet), but I’ll check it out.  In the meantime, here’s what the publisher (Collins) has to say about it:

The scholarly discipline of Bullshit Studies has blossomed in the last several years, fertilized by a number of critical works on the subject and the growing importance of the issue across a wide range of professions. Now, best-selling author and lifelong practitioner Stanley Bing enters the field with a comprehensive look at the many attractive jobs now available to those who are serious about their bullshit and prepared to dedicate their working life to it.

What, Bing inquires, do a feng shui consultant, new media executive, wine steward, department store greeter, and Vice President of the United States have in common? What, too, are the actual duties performed by a McKinsey consultant? Other than sitting around making people nervous? Could that possibly be his core function? Likewise, what does an aromatherapist actually do, per se? Sniff things and rub them on people, for big fragrant bucks? Is that all?

The answer in all cases is “Yes.” They all have bullshit jobs.

These few, of course, are just the beginning. Across the length and breadth of this shrinking globe, skillful bullshit artists have secured pleasant, lucrative employment, and are enjoying themselves more than you are. In virtually every occupation, from Advertising to Yoga Franchising, lucky individuals who “work” in these coveted positions enjoy the best lives imaginable — they are paid well, they rarely break a sweat, and their professions are highly respected, because nobody really knows what they do.

At once funny, useful, and tolerably philosophical, this groundbreaking work takes a close look at 100 bullshit jobs — the money they bring with them, the actual tasks and activities involved (if any), and famous and successful examples of each position, who will provide the neophyte with inspiration. Most crucially, Bing goes on to offer what others so far have not–a clear, concise strategy to help job-seekers at every level reach for that brass ring, knowing full well that it may be attached to the nose of a bull.

Source:  Collins Publishing (The book’s publisher)

Check ‘er out.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Grade:  C

[Please make sure to check out my Book Review Guidelines for what I look for in a book and how I evaluate same.]

Saying Yes To Life — Even the Hard Parts, a new book by Ezra Bayda with Josh Bartok, is just one of those books that you want to like.  It has a forward and an endorsement from Thomas Moore (love him to pieces), author of Care of the Soul, and that Zen approach to all things gentle and kind.

But, I just don’t find a whole lot to inspire, calm, or motivate me.  Sure, the book is filled with eternal, yet vague, wisdom such as “opening fully to the unwanted is the key to living with appreciation” or “living from perceived boundaries creates imaginary prisons,” but I just don’t find a lot of substance or anything to take away and think about.

In addition to the randomness of the thoughts contained within, the organization of the book is rather bewildering as well.  It seems as if the authors have merely written down some what seem-to-be clever observations on file cards, tossed them into the air, then listed them out in book form.

Often, when I don’t at first like or book or find that it draws me in, I’ll set it aside for a few days or weeks and return.  Sometimes I’ll feel better about the book.  Unfortunately, I can’t say that’s the case with Saying Yes To Life; in fact, each time I picked it up, I was saddened that I couldn’t feel any better about it.

Okay, really, I’ve tried the Zen thing, and I do find comfort and thought-provoking elements in some of the literature; this book, though, isn’t one of the resources I’ll return to.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Grade:  Top5er

[Please make sure to check out my Book Review Guidelines for what I look for in a book and how I evaluate same.]

Let me start off this review like this:  If you’re even faintly interested in success books, skip this review and go buy 50 Success Classics today — or grab it from your library or steal it from a friend.

It’s that good and it’s that vital for your path.

Tom Butler-Bowden has written a book called 50 Success Classics, and it — in and of itself — is a classic in my book.

TBB has studied the best of the best in the success literature genre.  This quest must have taken him a couple of years, at least, and it’s evident.  He knows the field, and he’s organized his book around four sub-categories within the success genre:

• Motivation
• Fulfilling your potential
• Prosperity
• Leadership

Within the Motivation category, Butler-Bowden profiles 14 classics, including:

1. Frank Bettger’s How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling.
2. Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
3. Anthony Robbins’ Unlimited Power.
4. Zig Ziglar’s See You at the Top.

From the Potential group, TBB includes these from among 12 covered:

1. Cheryl Richardson’s Take Time for Your Life.
2. Richard Wiseman’s The Luck Factor.

In the Prosperity category, Butler-Bowden covers the following among his 10 selections:

1. Russell Conwell’s Acres of Diamonds.
2. Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich.
3. Robert Kiyosaki’s Rich Dad, Poor Dad.

And, in the leadership group, TBB includes the following among the 14 selections:

1. Roger Lowenstein’s Buffett.
2. Michael Dell’s Direct from Dell.
3. Nelson Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom.

What’s most impressive is that it’s clear early on that Butler-Bowdon hasn’t skimmed these books; he’s studied and reflected on them.  I checked him, you see, by reviewing his comments about the classics that I’ve studied and know rather well, and TBB has nailed ‘em.

For each selection, Butler-Bowdon includes short selections (quotes), a very brief “in a nutshell” one-two sentence summary of each book’s chief point, and a three-four page overview of the book.

I find it amazing that he’s been able to review so much in the success field and to be able to summarize his research so succinctly and well.

Butler-Bowdon is also the author of 50 Self-Help Classics and 50 Spiritual Classics, and I look forward to reviewing them both in the coming weeks.

50 Success Classics is available from the Dream Jobs Dialog Bookshop.

So, check it out . . . this jewel is top drawer.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Grade: A-

[Please make sure to check out my Book Review Guidelines for what I look for in a book and how I evaluate same.] 

Author of small is the new big — and 183 other riffs, rants, and remarkable business ideas, Seth Godin is:

• Funny
• Witty
• Business-savvy
• Smart
• Interesting
• Enjoyable
• Easy-to-read
• Provocative

He’s a business thinker, an advocate for sanity in our work and personal lives, a consumate marketer (of himself, his ideas, and things he likes in others), and a challenger of all-things-ordinary.

I don’t know Seth personally, but I’m sure I’d like him — he’d certainly be a hoot to hang out with at Wal-Mart.

I’ve eaten up some of his earlier books (Permission Marketing and Unleashing the Idea Virus are my two favorites), and small is the new big is enjoyable and somewhat informative, but it’s not quite as innovative as these earlier books.

Here Godin offers up 184 (I didn’t count them, so I’ll take the publisher’s word for it) thoughts and ideas — with titles that range from Bon Jovi and the Pirates to Respect and the Fuller Brush Man — that he’s written over the years in his blog and at his website.

He challenges you and does make you think about your own business (if you have one) or your work within a business (if you don’t).

For example, he’s got this to say about socks:

I love this Web site:  LittleMissmatch.com

They sell mismatched socks for eleven-year-old girls.  Hundreds of varieties, four categories so you don’t clash.  Only sold in odd lots.  You can’t buy a pair.  There are 133 styles, and none of them match.

Think about how easy this was to do, and how remarkable it is.  Think about how many sock marketers thought of this and then got scared and didn’t go for it.  Realize how turning socks into a remarkable collectible is both obvious and satisfying and likely to succeed.

I wish they came in my size.

But why should you care about socks?  After all, you make something serious, you sell to big business, you have a factory, you deal in intangibles.

That’s exactly why you should care.  Socks used to be a low-margin, low-interest commodity.  Littlemissmatch.com changes that by creating a fashion.  Why, precisely, can’t you?

Hmm, why not indeed?

Or, take the following, which contains an awfully cool idea, actually . . .

The Soy Luck Club, my favorite place in New York, just announced the breakfast club.  Pay $40 or so and you get breakfast every day for a month.  “Grab and Go,” it’s called.  If Vivian sells one hundred memberships, it’s a home run.  With $4,000, she can certainly buy a lot of whole-wheat bagels and grapefruit, and she ends up creating a cadre of superloyal customers.  Best of all, she starts finding products for her customers instead of finding customers for her products.

Imagine a new chain of cafes that offers a coffee club.  For a flat fee, you get all the WiFi and lattes you can handle.  With the markup on both, the owner does great, and people would feel terrible every time they strayed.

They say to ignore sunk costs.  People are terrible at that, though.

I could go on . . . and on.  Lots of ideas here, well presented.  I wish there was a little more commentary from Seth that tied some of his thoughts together, and that’s really the only thing keeping this fun book from being an A in my book.

However, this one does make it into the Dream Jobs Dialog Bookshop, so check it out.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Over the course of my life, I’ve read hundreds of success, motivation, career, self-help, how-to, and entrepreneurial books — the classics and the unheard-ofs alike.

I’ll now start reviewing some of the best of the best along with newbies that are just hitting the bookstore shelves.

If you have a book or audio book that you’d like others to know about, or if you’ve read something that has made a lasting impression, will you tell me about it so we can put it on the reviewer’s list here at Dream Jobs Dialog?

Anything that fits my junkie passion (see the list above) is fair game, so let me know.

For additional information about how I review books, please see my Book Review Guidelines.

Check it out.

Popularity: 11% [?]