Amongst some of the very lovely gifts I was given, I have a really nice selection of books that I need to make time for:

• The Art Of The Start, by Guy Kawasaki – very little to say about this one since it is so well-known, but I’ve been meaning to read the full thing since I was given a precis of the first chapter by a friend.
• Don’t Sleep, there are Snakes, by Daniel Everett – this is a story of language and life experienced by a missionary living with a tribe fo Amazonians. I haven’t read any of this yet, but was captivated by an abridged version read on the radio.
• Making History, by Stephen Fry – this Fry’s only work of fiction I believe, and I have very high hopes for it. Reviews have been invariably flattering, but then Fry’s name alone commands a good amount of benefit of doubt.
• The Black Swan, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb – an explanation, of sorts, of randomness and how it affects our lives. I’m not totally sure what to expect of this yet.
• Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion, by Robert B. Cialdini – again, a relatively well-known book which doesn’t need an awful lot of discussion here.

I’m looking forward to reading all of these, and will post small reviews as I get there. Slightly interestingly, to me at least, the last book on the list – Influence – was actually recommended to me by the same friend who passed on the TAotS precis, but too late for Christmas. Somewhat bizarrely, I had already put it on a list of books  I was interested in sometime in November, and the list was very short and little thought was put into it – indeed, I re-did my list in early December from scratch, “Influence” didn’t make it back in and I didn’t think about it again until I received it on Boxing Day.

Perhaps also what I need is some bookshelf type module for my blog too, to remind myself of what I’ve read through so that I can review it at the end of the year – some kind of new year’s resolution appears to be calling.