Review: Charlotte's Web

Charlotte's Web is the story of a girl, a pig and a spider - and turns out to be a gently touching tale of friendship and sacrifice.

It's not a story with a lot of action - but somehow is all the better for it. The characters are simply but distinctly drawn. It would be a hard person who was not profoundly affected by the fate of one of the characters at the end.  Surprisingly for a children's book, it doesn't pull any punches about hard topics like death and the cycle of life.

As befitting a writer of a classic style guide, White's prose is wonderfully economical and precise.

Verdict: Life-affirming little gem

Review: Pride

Pride tells the uplifting, and occasionally sorrowful, story of how a group of gays and lesbians came to raise money and support the miners during their strike of 1984.   The result is a deeply comedic and sometimes moving study of friendship across a cultural divide.

It has a wonderful eye for period detail and really took me back to those pre-internet and far less enlightened times.

Verdict: Rare slice of social history

Review: A Message to Garcia and other essential writings on success.

This is a short read, barely more than a pamphlet really and proclaims itself as a candidate for the most widely distributed piece of literature within the author's lifetime.

"Fear is the rock on which we split"

Elbert Hubbard

Viewed more than a century on, the message of quiet initiative remains relevant - even if the central story, that of a soldier in the Spanish-American war entrusted with a mission to deliver a message to someone of unknown location, has long disappeared into historical exaggeration.

"We are gods in the chrysalis". 

Elbert Hubbard

His other essays continue the theme, and it's clear Hubbard has no time for idleness among the rich or poor.

"If the concern where you are employed is all wrong, and the Old Man a curmudgeon, it may be well for you to go to the Old Man and confidentially, quietly and kindly tell him that he is a curmudgeon. Explain to him that his policy is absurd and preposterous. Then show him how to reform his ways, and you might offer to take charge of the concern and cleanse it of its secret faults. Do this, or if for any reason you should prefer not, then take your choice of these: Get Out, or Get in Line."

Elbert Hubbard

With its extortions to be radio-active(!) and avoid attacks of cerebral elephantiasis (big headedness), I'm left with the impression that the author would have been amusing and eccentric company by today's standards.

Verdict: Humour and poetic turn of phrase lifts this early self-help pamphlet.

Review: The Adventures of Prince Achmed

Delightful early animated fantasy based on tales from the Arabian nights.  Tricked by a magician into jumping on a flying horse, the titular prince is transported to foreign lands where he encounters beauties and beasties aplenty.   Fairy tale lovers will be intrigued by the slightly different take on Aladdin and his magical lamp.

The film uses a distinctive silhouette animation technique which suits the limitations of early film - and remains fresh nearly hundred years on. The version I saw also benefited from a few spots of narration, penned by the original director, Lotte Reiniger and was in the original tinted colour.

Verdict: The original colour feature animation.

Review: High Plains Drifter

Early 70s revenge Western with flashes of darkly comic humour and hints of the supernatural.

Plot wise, it feels slightly confused - but all you really need to know is that there's skullduggery lurking in various quarters - and Clint means to make them pay.

Eastwood brings gruff charisma to the eponymous part. When he smiles though, his natural star quality is in danger of breaking the illusion.


Verdict: Solid Western with unusual imagery. 

Review: A Little Princess

Hodgson Burnett's tale of resilience neatly complements later The Secret Garden. Where that was the tale of a girl slowly being transformed by a near-supernatural place, A Little Princess is about a near already formed girl who must remain steadfast in the face of multiple adversities in one of the most mundane of locations.

I loved that she choose imagination as her primary tool to help her survive difficult circumstances.

If I had to pick, I probably prefer this of the two books.  Sara Crewe is a very appealing character and it has a less obvious plot. In addition, the magical and anthropomorphic elements feel a little less fanciful and laboured than in The Secret Garden.

Verdict: Classic story of childhood fortitude.

Review: Fast Forward: How Women Can Achieve Power and Purpose

As a middle-aged white bloke, a self help guide on women's workplace empowerment was perhaps a surprising choice for me to read.  But I like to expose myself to good ideas regardless of where they are coming from. It also helped that it was incredibly cheap from Amazon's marketplace and I was looking for a book to try out my new 80/20 book reading approach (more on that in another post perhaps).

Verveer and Azzarelli have produced a guide which is both motivating and practical. Be warned, it does tend to lean significantly towards storytelling. But many of the stories are memorable and may just be the jolt you need.

The first chapter I jumped into was "Find your purpose". Disappointingly, this turns out to be more of an instruction rather than offering tactics and approaches on how to do so.

"Dissents speak to a future age. The greatest dissents do become court opinions and gradually over time their views become the dominant view. So that's the dissenter's hope: that they are writing not for today, but for tomorrow".

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

The chapter on leadership was more useful.  As a bit of a geek, I was fascinated by Google's data driven approach to getting more female engineers to apply for promotions. They found that if they accompanied job descriptions with two studies showing girls and women were less likely to put their hands in math classes and meetings (despite often being better than their male counterparts), they got more applications.

"What I found was that whenever you offer someone flexibility to manage what's important in their lives, you're avoiding them having to make a choice between what's important to them in life, and work will lose every time. The benefit of giving them a third option is that you will get loyalty you can't get any other way, no matter how much money you pay them". 

Susan Sobbot

"Why the Middle Matters" is a useful reminder of the power and influence middle management can exert given their position in the organisation - and their role in raising new ideas. As a middle manager myself, I can testify that it doesn't always feel that way, although I found myself nodding at the following observation:

"Knowing where you are in the organisation, and knowing the power you have to influence and the power you have to make recommendations - don't get surprised when your recommendations gets taken".

Bea Perez, Coca Cola

as well as the expectation that as the raiser you will deliver the solution!

The Entrepreneurs and Innovators chapter provides some sound tips on resilience in the face of setback like the one below:

"You know, Mrs Clinton, the best ideas die in bank parking lots"

Anon on the difficulty of women getting startup funding from traditional sources

  I was particularly moved by Pauline Brown on the power of sabbaticals:

"Little by little, things starting coming back to me that gave me joy".

Ideas provoked:

• Could staff leave letter to their successors giving the instant track on what works and what doesn't?
• Can Freshpaper help Asda with their plastics-free challenge?

Finally, the toolkit at the back of the book went beyond the usual homilies. I took away the following tips:

• Think strategically about what problems will need to be solved in the future, and what your role will be. 
• "Confident is the stuff that turns thoughts into action" - a wonderfully concise definition. 
• The higher you aim, the harsher the criticism you will get. 
• Substitute junk media for quality media - perhaps by keeping a diary of what you read and watch initially, going cold turkey and slowly introducing things back into it. 
• What matters to you? What do you find yourself drifting towards when reading? What do you want to change in your own life, in your community or in the world? Make a list of your top three?

Verdict: Toolkit is gold. Rest powerfully inspiring.