Novel 11, Book 18 by Dag Solstad. The reason I started reading this Norwegian author is that I had previously read other books originally written in Norwegian and translated into English by Sverre Lyngstad, like “Hunger” by Knut Hamsun. Fifty-year-old Bjorg Hansen has been living in a small city, where he fled to be with […]

T. Singer by Dag Solstad. On the cover of this book there is the quotation: “Utterly humane”.  When I first saw this quotation, I thought to myself –we are all humans, what’s the big deal? It was until I was deep in the second half of the book that I understood the reason. This  book

Five Levels of Leadership by John Maxwell (2013). This books describes different levels of leadership in a managerial context. At the lower level of leadership people follow you because they have to, but they don’t necessarily like you. When they like you, then you are in a new level in which people follow you because

The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver by Shawn Inmon. This book is both strange and enjoyable. Thomas Weaver, a man in his fifties, is unemployed and lives with his mother after his divorce. He decides to take his own life after decades of struggling with depression, which began when he accidentally killed his beloved

Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz (1956). This book is about a family in Cairo, Egypt  in the early 20 century during WW1.  This book captures the culture  of an ultraconservative family, and at the same time provides us with a good understanding of the thoughts, feelings and the sorrows  of each member of the family.

Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford (2005). Genghis Khan conquered more land than any other man in history. An area about the size of the African continent. He and his generals controlled western Asia as far north as today’s Korea and as far south as today’s Vietnam. On the

The Martian by Andy Weir. This book is fantastic. Is the best fiction I’ve read in many years. Although it is clearly not a masterpiece of literature, the ideas, contents and emotions coming out from the author’s mind are pure genius. Reading this book kept me awake, daydreaming for hours. I would recommend to anyone

Total recall by Arnold Schwarzenegger (2013). I enjoyed this book a lot. I regard Arnold as probably one of the most outstanding examples of the American Dream. He came to America to pursue success, and he got everything he wanted. He won the title of the best bodybuilder in the world, and he did it

Stranger than fiction by Chuck Palahniuk (2005). I read just a couple of chapters of this book, not because the rest of the book is not good, but because this book is not really a novel. This book is a collection of independent experiences. It seems like his book was written in-between majors works. “Reading is