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patlo's Reviews (1.32k)
The best printed resource for motorcycle travel round the world. Read HUBB website also
If you remember Matt, from all the YouTube video clips of the guy dancing in silly ways in front of the world's monuments and with a bunch of the world's cultures... this is his travel memoir. It's as lighthearted and funny as you would expect, given how the guy dances.
What a fascinating, insightful, inspiring story. Lawrence Hacking rode a Honda XR650R in the 2001 Dakar Rally, which takes motorcycles, racing trucks, cars, buggies and every other extreme off-road race vehicle on a tour from Paris to Dakar. I knew something about the Dakar rally before reading this book, but I am a fan for life now. Hacking and his writer tell a fantastic story, deeply engaging and emotionally charged.
If you only know the Dakar from Charlie Boorman (of Long Way Round and Long Way Down fame alongside Ewan Macgregor), read this also. Hacking is an experienced, pro-level off-road racer who faced serious challenges in his quest to become the first Canadian to finish the Dakar rally. And he did it as a privateer, without big sponsorship.
If you like adventure travel/gearhead/sport/trans-cultural stories, you'll love this one. I'll definitely re-read it many times.
If you only know the Dakar from Charlie Boorman (of Long Way Round and Long Way Down fame alongside Ewan Macgregor), read this also. Hacking is an experienced, pro-level off-road racer who faced serious challenges in his quest to become the first Canadian to finish the Dakar rally. And he did it as a privateer, without big sponsorship.
If you like adventure travel/gearhead/sport/trans-cultural stories, you'll love this one. I'll definitely re-read it many times.
The Shallows is a very, very important book.
It examines the changes in the neural pathways that the web takes us through, and lays out the risks for those of us who are learning to think the way the web does. It is extremely well researched and thorough; footnotes are helpful and abundant.
It's "funny" that it takes some concentration to get through the book. When I first read the author's story in the NY Times, "Is Google Making Us Stupid", from which this book was based, I saw clearly the changes in my own attention span and attention to detail. I started reading poetry and novels again, just to reprogram my mind. I see my own tendency toward Internet addiction as well, checking email frequently, surfing the web while watching movies with the family, reading news when commuting and listening to music... and I see that tendency much more deeply in my younger relatives who literally text each other when sitting on the couch next to each other and speak in txt shorthand.
I recently finished a doctoral dissertation in spiritual formation and social networks, and I really wish I'd have been able to include this book in the chapter I wrote on the shift to Internet based social networking. It's not an academic work, but it's an important one that I recommend highly to anybody who wants to think clearly.
It examines the changes in the neural pathways that the web takes us through, and lays out the risks for those of us who are learning to think the way the web does. It is extremely well researched and thorough; footnotes are helpful and abundant.
It's "funny" that it takes some concentration to get through the book. When I first read the author's story in the NY Times, "Is Google Making Us Stupid", from which this book was based, I saw clearly the changes in my own attention span and attention to detail. I started reading poetry and novels again, just to reprogram my mind. I see my own tendency toward Internet addiction as well, checking email frequently, surfing the web while watching movies with the family, reading news when commuting and listening to music... and I see that tendency much more deeply in my younger relatives who literally text each other when sitting on the couch next to each other and speak in txt shorthand.
I recently finished a doctoral dissertation in spiritual formation and social networks, and I really wish I'd have been able to include this book in the chapter I wrote on the shift to Internet based social networking. It's not an academic work, but it's an important one that I recommend highly to anybody who wants to think clearly.
3.75 stars for this one!
It's a bit too long and wordy (75 pages less would be about right). But meandering as it does through culture, toymaking, weather-vs-climate, polar ice, environmentalism, ocean currents, transoceanic shipping and childrens toys, this is a fascinating look at one of those great universal stories: 28800 plastic bath toys are lost at sea during shipping between China and Seattle, and then wash up on beaches for the next couple of decades.
It's a nicely explored book, well researched and well told. I learned a lot more than I thought I would, though there were also sections when I could loosely skim 15 or 20 pages and not care about what I missed.
Hohn is at his best when describing people and objects; he's really witty and fun. This makes the meandering worthwhile.
It's a bit too long and wordy (75 pages less would be about right). But meandering as it does through culture, toymaking, weather-vs-climate, polar ice, environmentalism, ocean currents, transoceanic shipping and childrens toys, this is a fascinating look at one of those great universal stories: 28800 plastic bath toys are lost at sea during shipping between China and Seattle, and then wash up on beaches for the next couple of decades.
It's a nicely explored book, well researched and well told. I learned a lot more than I thought I would, though there were also sections when I could loosely skim 15 or 20 pages and not care about what I missed.
Hohn is at his best when describing people and objects; he's really witty and fun. This makes the meandering worthwhile.