I read Michelle Moran's Nefertiti first, inspired to check out her other books after the fabulousness which was Madame Tussaud. I don't know why I chose this one, her first, of all her Ancient Egypt-set books though it may have been the only immediately available at the library. Nefertiti, as the name implies, is about the famous Egyptian queen and fictionally explores her cunning rise to power through the eyes of her younger sister Mutny. Nefertiti becomes a second wife to Pharaoh Akhenaten and then basically struggles to outwit and overcome Kiya, his first wife (and the presumed mother to King Tut), and keep Akhenaten's outrageous ideas under control; Mutny, on the other hand, would just like out of the palace intrigues and to live a peaceful life tending her garden. Although some Amazon reviews criticized it for having thin characters, I found Nefertiti entertaining enough for a summer read, though clearly Moran's writing style has, not suprisingly, significantly improved since this first book.
After Nefertiti, I tackled Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers, which I'd had on my bookshelf for ages. I'd wanted to read it after my mom had told me about hearing him speak at a business conference; the topic had apparently been on the part of the book that explores the hours of practice (10,000) it takes to be successful in any given field. Based on that, I expected that the book's message would be about the link between hard work and success, but that's not really what it was about at all. It was more about how people are randomly, statistically chosen for success and it doesn't have all that much to do with talent. For example, if you want to be a successful hockey player, you'd better have been born in January because kids are filtered into gifted programs at an early age and the hockey cut-off is December 31 - meaning that the January kids are likely bigger (being older) and from there, the advantages of being in gifted programs accrue and once you're slated into a track, it's hard to get out of it.
I think the premise is supposed to be uplifting in that there's no such thing as extraordinary individuals (uplifting for those who are not) but rather success is a combination of various societal factors that you have no control over. But personally, I found the whole thing depressing. If success is based on uncontrollable random elements and things set in motion before you were born, why bother trying? While his theory may be true, I felt that it lacked personal responsibility, that duty to get up and do your best to do your thing every single day. Still though, the anecdotes were fascinating, and I've repeated one or two in conversation.
Admittedly though, I was hooked to Outliers from page one, mostly because of a random (!) personal connection. The first story is about immigrants from Roseto, which is the little town in southern Italy that my great-grandfather was from. In the book, Gladwell tells how a bunch of Rosetians moved to Pennsylvania, to a small town they appropriately named Roseto, and a couple of researchers discovered that in the 50s and 60s they had an abnormally low rate of heart disease, which ended up being because of strong community bonds. Unfortunately for my great-grandfather, he chose to emigrate to a different Pennsylvania town, Philadelphia - where he died of a heart attack in the mid-1950s. :(
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