Review: The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses

The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses by Eric Ries

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



This is probably the top business book that has been recommended to me since I joined a startup. Now that I have read it, I can understand why - it ought to be required reading for anyone coming from a big company into a fast-paced startup. I had many a "a-ha" moment reading this, like "Oh, that's why we are shipping a product that seems incomplete...it's on purpose!"

The concept of Lean Manufacturing grew out of the Toyota Production Systems innovations of the mid-20th century. This comprised the idea of constantly improving systems, measuring more important things, and driving organizational learning. In grad school, I remember learning about this, and about its influence on the software industry. Agile/scrum development seems to have its roots in Lean.

So all this forms the backdrop for the ideas in this book - that companies and projects in general can use a lot of the same concepts that have fundamentally improved Manufacturing and Software Development. There's a real focus on learning and structuring the product development process to increase the speed with which everyone learns. (And it is worth pointing out that like Innovator's Dilemma, this is relevant for innovative parts of big companies, not just startups.) Two items stuck with me the most:

1. Vanity Metrics - Ries argues strongly against using vanity metrics when evaluating a change to a product. He says that too often metrics are chosen that look like improvements when really they aren't, like number of downloads (without number of repeat customers) or number of repeat customers (without number of paying customers.) He says you really need to know what you are measuring and why.

2. Experiments - Ries gives several examples of how you want to run experiments about your product in real life with real customers. If your audience is big enough, A/B test actual features. Release great products without all their features to see if you have Andreesen's elusive product/market fit. Ask focus group customers the right questions, not question your existing assumptions.

It's his examples that I liked the most - they were perfectly relevant and constructive. He's delightfully honest about how hard it is to learn this way by sharing his experiences at his company IMVU. In any case, this is a MUST-READ for people interested in the model for success in technical innovation in the next decade. It's in my mental bookshelf next to "Innovator's Dilemma" "Good to Great" and "Crossing the Chasm."



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Review: The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair by Joël Dicker

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



This was a really interesting book. I saw it at Trident Cafe and bought it on a whim.

The story is about a young author (Marcus) whose author mentor Harry Quebert is accused of murdering a young woman. Marcus, who is having difficulty writing the followup to his best-selling book, puts his life on hold to help Harry clear his name in a small town in New Hampshire.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a classic mystery - with Marcus, I was figuring out what happened, among a cast of quirky, colorful, odd characters. I kept being surprised by twists in the plot, and I kept wanting to know what would happen next. I liked how some of the story was told through a book Harry wrote, and some of the story was told through a book that Marcus wrote.

While I did find a few sections in the middle a little slow, overall this book kept my attention and I enjoyed it.



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Review: Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt

Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt by Michael Lewis

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Michael Lewis never, ever (ever) disappoints. And this book was no exception.

Released with little pre-press lead-up, this book starts with a detailed description of a fiberoptic cable being laid through the Alleghany Mountains. *Through*, not *around*, being the operative word - because going through the mountains reduces the computer latency between NY and Chicago by a couple of milliseconds, and this is how people make money.

Lewis looks into this dark, weird, shady part of the financial industry, called "high frequency trading" that basically exploits unnatural benefits like millisecond differences in who has information when. His narrative follows some guys at Royal Bank of Canada who figure out what is going on and set out to find a different way to more fairly operate a stock exchange. As usual with Lewis, the characters were well-developed and appealing to follow.

Though the book was heavily criticized by insiders as being everything from entirely untrue to being a sales pitch for this new exchange, I think it's a case where criticism is indicating concern on the part of the incumbents.

As a stockholder, I was horrified by this book. As a reader, I was enthralled.



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Review: Some Girls: My Life in a Harem

Some Girls: My Life in a Harem by Jillian Lauren

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



I first heard Jillian speak on an episode of The Moth, on NPR. Her story - that of being a theater school dropout who interviews with a "casting director" for what turns out to be a gig "entertaining" the younger brother of the Sultan of Brunei - caught my attention.

It was the People Magazine-reading part of me that thought this would be an appealing story, and it was satiated at that level of quality. This was a fun read, a quick read, but not a high quality Jeannette-Walls read. I liked reading about her time with the other women in Borneo, and I was fascinated by her relationship with the Sultan and his brother. And I'll admit, I was more than a little curious reading about a harem and its goings-on.

But I didn't find the book uplifting, or the author particularly likable. She comes across as victimized but really made a lot of choices at a lot of junctures to get her where she ended up. Her brief forays into her personal life growing up and as a young adult didn't change my mind about her either, and seemed kind of choppy in the narrative.



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Review: Uncle Petros and Goldbach's Conjecture: A Novel of Mathematical Obsession

Uncle Petros and Goldbach's Conjecture: A Novel of Mathematical Obsession by Apostolos Doxiadis

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



A new friend at work recommended this book to me, and it was one of those things where you appreciate new book friends who expose you to books you wouldn't otherwise know anything about.

This novel was close to my heart in that it was about a mathematician who spent his life chasing an elusive proof of a difficult problem. The story is told by his nephew, who also pursues mathematics. I really liked the storyline itself as well as the glimpses of math. There is a pivotal plot element based on Godel's Incompleteness Theorem, which I spent several courses at school studying, so that was fun, too.

My only complaint was that the writing and the character development weren't great. And I think you really had to be a math person to read this That said, I'm glad I gave it a try!



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Review: Crow Lake

Crow Lake by Mary Lawson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Terry recommended this book to me years ago and I just go around to reading it. It was wonderfully written - very sad but great.

The story follows Kate Morrison and her two older brothers (Luke and Matt) and younger sister Bo. Growing up in Ontario, her parents are tragically killed when she is a child. Her older brothers sacrifice their own futures to keep the family together and the book follows the children into adulthood.

The writing in this book was superb. I could feel what the characters were feeling (heartbreak, yearning, hope) and see their surroundings. The characters were very likable, although imperfect, and the epiphany the protagonist goes through towards the end is one of the most striking I can remember reading recently.

Definitely recommend this book and look forward to reading another by the same author.



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