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Clay

[Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Jonathon Howard of Di Mortui Sunt]

I just finished reading Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational: the Hidden Forces that Shape our Decisions. It is yet another book cashing in on the market’s love of laymen economics, in the vein of The Tipping Point and Freakonomics.  Like its literary predecessors, PI claims to explain all the quirks of humanity through the lens of Econonics, which as a science has about the same amount of credibility as say your local weatherman.  You know, the one with an associates degree in journalism.

To Dan’s credit though, his field of economics is called “behavioral,” and the field conducts experiments involving actual humans as opposed to trolling through vast fields of numerical data, making random odd pairs in the hopes of stumbling upon one that is correlated significantly enough and then screaming it from the rooftops, as an insightful, new view of human transactions. Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Rating: 7.2

Editor’s Note: This review is a fourth entry in a series of weekly e-book reviews.  The review is by Thursday Bram of ThursdayBram.com.

Reading Stephen Smith’s free e-book, “Project Planning in Context,” I was continuously struck by a sense of potential. Sure, Smith’s book didn’t have the spit and polish of some of the e-books out there. At the same time, however, “Project Planning in Context” got the job done.

Essentially, Smith’s e-book is a good primer — an introduction to the idea of planning out a project by considering its context. At the very least, Smith saves his readers from slogging through years of posts on the subject from people like Merlin Mann. Smith clearly covers the pertinent details and avoids unnecessary length. More importantly, “Project Planning in Context” fills a niche: there are, after all, an unbelievable number of e-books on the general topic of productivity, but far fewer resources that cover the topic of planning large projects effectively.

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Escape 101, by Dan Clements and Tara Gignac, is as much about boldly creating personal change as it is about escaping our comfort zones. The book is not another over-romanticized travel guide for 20-somethings. It is deeply grounded in reality, was written for everyone from business owners to parents, and provides a step-by-step plan for getting its readers on sabbatical.

Because I enjoyed the e-book so much (it’s also available in print), I’m honored to present this interview with Dan. (Please see this book excerpt and consider joining Dan’s mailing list if you’d like a deeper look). Escape 101 is a book that stands to blow open your reality and show you how to break the rules in all the right ways; I believe this interview provides a taste of that.

Let’s get started . . .

At its core, Escape 101 seems to be more about lifestyle design than anything else.  What are some of the more interestingly designed lives you’ve seen?

I’ve met gold prospectors, people who deliver yachts from island to island, surf instructors, and jungle animal workers. We’ve traveled with people who have been on the road for years, people who’ve climbed Everest, people who worked with the sick, the poor and the homeless, and freelance writers and journalists who interview the rich and famous and travel the globe. Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Rating: 7.9

Editor’s Note: This review is a fourth entry in a series of weekly e-book reviews.  The review is a guest post by Thursday Bram of ThursdayBram.com.

David Bohl’s ebook, “Your Life in Balance,” is part one of Bohl’s three-part Slow Down Fast Happiness Trilogy which collectively sells for $37.60.  The book is ideal for those of us who need a details than many self-help gurus seem able to offer up. Beyond describing the sorts of changes that a person might make in order to balance his or her life, Bohl provides exercises as well as questions for readers to ask themselves in order to focus their efforts in the parts of their lives where the most change is necessary.

Bohl left a career that was successful on the surface but was becoming a problem in his life. He was very successful financially by his mid-30s, but he had no time for his family and was mentally exhausted. He took a drastic approach to finding his own life balance — he essentially quit and became a consultant.

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Editor’s Rating: 6.4

Editor’s Note: This review is a third entry in a series of weekly e-book reviews.  The review is a guest post by Thursday Bram of ThursdayBram.com.

The premise of Scott Young’s How to Change a Habit is the plain old fact that everybody wants to change their habits. Much of the blogosphere seems predicated on this fact, from Leo Babauta’s efforts on Zen Habits to J.D. Roth’s bettering of his personal finances through good money habits on Get Rich Slowly.

The key message in Young’s e-book is that the ability to change one’s habits is a simple skill that can be developed.

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Editor’s Rating: 8.2

Editor’s Notes: Here is a second entry in a series of e-book reviews.  This is a guest post by Thursday Bram of ThursdayBram.com.

Leo Babauta, author of the Zen Habits blog, seems to have the knack for writing effective material.

His e-book, Zen to Done, is no different. In 83 pages, Babauta distills hundreds of his own blog posts, the 267 pages in David Allen’s Getting Things Done and the 384 pages of Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Babauta took his own mantra of a simple system to heart when writing this e-book. Despite the sheer quantity of information that could have overwhelmed a reader, Babauta managed to avoid the avalanche and provide readers with something that they could actually read one sitting or refer back to as needed. To put it simply, not only was I able to make my way through Zen to Done but it was also an enjoyable experience.

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Editor’s Rating: 7.1

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Thursday Bram of ThursdayBram.com.

Mark McGuiness begins his free e-book, Time Management for Creative People with a stereotypical "day-in-the-life" depiction of a designer trying to work on a creative project but facing disorganization in all of its facets: distracting emails, interrupting phone calls and important files lost on a messy desk. One might argue that this is a stereotype — that most creatives can handle a bit of basic organization, but there is a grain of truth in there somewhere. There are plenty of creative professionals who could do with some organization.

The real value in McGuiness’ e-book is what he doesn’t suggest. He makes no effort to impose some sort of order on the actual creative process; there is no effort to turn every creative into Thomas Kinkade. Instead, McGuiness focuses on managing the little details that often intrude on a professional’s time, but that cannot be ignored.
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Editor’s Rating: 8.7

Editor’s Note: This review is a fifth entry in a series of e-book reviews.  The review is by Thursday Bram of ThursdayBram.com.

One page into Alexis Dawes’ e-book, “Desperate Buyers Only,” I was fully prepared to hate my reading experience. I noticed a typo, and for someone who has worked as a proofreader, a typo in final copy can be the kiss of death.

I was more than pleasantly surprised as I made my way through “Desperate Buyers Only,” however. I can tell you know that I’ll be rereading it multiple times — the sheer quantity of information Dawes has collected has made her e-book the go-to resource when thinking about selling a report.

Dawes goes far beyond simple advice on how to prepare such a report: she guides her readers through every step of the project from brainstorming a topic to affiliate marketing and targeting keyword ads. She’s written to a level of depth that I can’t help comparing to John Chow’s blogging but his depth comes from years of blogging on the topic of how to make money online, while Dawes does it in less than 100 pages. Dawes manages this by drawing on her own, highly successful experiences — she has reports that have been selling for years but still bring her in a daily income of at least $200.

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