Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

Noted Fitzgerald biographer Matthew J. Bruccoli draws upon years of research to present the Fitzgerald's Jazz Age romance exactly as he intended according to the original manuscript, revisions, and corrections--with explanatory notes. Reprint.

Animal Farm

by George Orwell

A farm is taken over by its overworked, mistreated animals. With flaming idealism and stirring slogans, they set out to create a paradise of progress, justice, and equality. Thus the stage is set for one of the most telling satiric fables ever penned - a razor-edged fairy tale for grown-ups that records the evolution from revolution against tyranny to a totalitarianism just as terrible. When Animal Farm was first... (more)

The Devil's Dictionary (Dover Thrift Editions)

The Devil's Dictionary (Dover Thrift Editions)

by Jean-Claude Suares, Ambrose Bierce

Adapted and illustrated by Gahan Wilson, The Devil's Dictionary is a hilarious satire from one of the most brilliant and incisive writers of all time--Ambrose Bierce. Gahan Wilson's work appears regularly in The New Yorker and Playboy; he illustrated the Classics Illustrated version of Poe's The Raven and Other Stories.

Robert Langdon: Book 2

The Da Vinci Code

by Dan Brown

An ingenious code hidden in the works of Leonardo da Vinci. A desperate race through the cathedrals and castles of Europe. An astonishing truth concealed for centuries . . . unveiled at last. As millions of readers around the globe have already discovered, The Da Vinci Code is a reading experience unlike any other. Simultaneously lightning-paced, intelligent, and intricately layered with remarkable... (more)

Slaughterhouse-Five

Or, the Children's Crusade: A Duty Dance with Death

by Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut's absurdist classic Slaughterhouse-Five introduces us to Billy Pilgrim, a man who becomes unstuck in time after he is abducted by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore. In a plot-scrambling display of virtuosity, we follow Pilgrim simulta

A Clockwork Orange

by Anthony Burgess

"Anthony Burgess reads chapters of his novel A Clockwork Orange with hair-raising drive and energy. Although it is a fantasy set in an Orwellian future, this is anything but a bedtime story." -The New York Times Told by the central character, Alex, this brilliant, hilarious, and disturbing novel creates an alarming futuristic vision of violence, high technology, and authoritarianism.Anthony Burgess' 1963... (more)

1984

by George Orwell

George Orwell's prophetic, nightmarish vision of "Negative Utopia" is timelier than ever-and its warnings more powerful.

The United States of Wal-Mart

by John Dicker

An irreverent, hard-hitting examination of the world's largest-and most reviled-corporation, which reveals that while Wal-Mart's dominance may be providing consumers with cheap goods and plentiful jobs, it may also be breeding a culture of discontent. It employs one of every 115 American workers. If it were a nation-state, it would be one of the world's top twenty economies. With yearly sales of nearly $260... (more)

Rocket Boys (aka October Sky)

by Homer H. Hickam

The true story, originally published as Rocket Boys , that inspired the Universal Pictures film. It was 1957, the year Sputnik raced across the Appalachian sky, and the small town of Coalwood, West Virginia, was slowly dying. Faced with an uncertain future, Homer Hickam nurtured a dream: to send rockets into outer space. The introspective son of the mine’s superintendent and a mother determined to get him out... (more)

Sam Walton: Made In America

by Sam Walton

It's a story about entrepreneur, and risk, and hard work, and knowing where you want to go and being willing to do what it takes to get there. And it's a story about believing in your idea even when maybe some other folks don't, and about sticking to your guns. Sam Walton. Meet a genuine American folk hero cut from the homespun cloth of America's heartland: Sam Walton, who turned a single dime store in a... (more)

The Bully of Bentonville

by Anthony Bianco

The largest company in the world by far, Wal-Mart takes in revenues in excess of $280 billion, employs 1.4 million American workers, and controls a large share of the business done by almost every U.S. consumer-product company. More than 138 million shoppers visit one of its 5,300 stores each week. But, as recent news stories show, Wal-Mart's "everyday low prices" come at a tremendous cost to workers, suppliers,... (more)

On Target: How the World's Hottest Retailer Hit a Bull's-Eye

On Target: How the World's Hottest Retailer Hit a Bull's-Eye

by Laura Rowley

The first behind-the-scenes look at the stunning success of America's hippest discount retailer Founded in 1962 by Minnesota-based department store Dayton's, Target has grown to become America's second most profitable retailer behind Wal-Mart. On Target is the first in-depth look at the business leaders and strategies that made Target such a runaway success. The company's easily recognizable red-and-white... (more)

Fear: A Cultural History

by Joanna Bourke

Fear — the word, itself, conjures the appropriate response. With a dark cacophony of associations like fright, dread, horror, panic, alarm, anxiety, and terror, fear is universally understood as one of the most basic and powerful of human emotions, obtaining a nearly palpable and overwhelming substance in today's world. In this remarkable, groundbreaking book, acclaimed historian Joanna Bourke covers the... (more)

Wal-Smart: What It Really Takes to Profit in a Wal-Mart World

Wal-Smart: What It Really Takes to Profit in a Wal-Mart World

by William H. Marquard

THE SECRET OF WAL-MART'S SUCCESS-AND YOURS Wal-Smart is not just a book about Wal-Mart. It's about the principles of leadership in a Wal-Mart economy. No matter what industry you work in, Wal-Mart influences the way you do business. In providing a new level of convenience, discount pricing, and efficiency, Wal-Mart has changed the rules of the global economy, the customer expectations for every... (more)

Our Underachieving Colleges: A Candid Look at How Much Students Learn and Why They Should Be Learning More

Our Underachieving Colleges: A Candid Look at How Much Students Learn and Why They Should Be Learning More

by Derek Curtis Bok

Drawing on a large body of empirical evidence, former Harvard President Derek Bok examines how much progress college students actually make toward widely accepted goals of undergraduate education. His conclusions are sobering. Although most students make gains in many important respects, they improve much less than they should in such important areas as writing, critical thinking, quantitative skills, and moral... (more)

The Little Engine That Could WalmartWatty Piper

The Little Engine That Could Walmart

by Watty Piper

The Wal-Mart Effect

How the World's Most Powerful Company Really Works--and How It's Transforming the American Economy

by Charles Fishman

Wal-Mart isn’t just the world’s biggest company, it is probably the world’s most written-about. But no book until this one has managed to penetrate its wall of silence or go beyond the usual polemics to analyze its actual effects on its customers, workers, and suppliers. Drawing on unprecedented interviews with former Wal-Mart executives and a wealth of staggering data (e.g., Americans spend $36 million an... (more)

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier

by Ishmael Beah

My new friends have begun to suspect I haven’t told them the full story of my life. “Why did you leave Sierra Leone?” “Because there is a war.” “You mean, you saw people running around with guns and shooting each other?” “Yes, all the time.” “Cool.” I smile a little. “You should tell us about it sometime.” “Yes, sometime.” This is how wars are fought now: by children, hopped-up on drugs and wielding AK-47s.... (more)

Kmart's Ten Deadly Sins: How Incompetence Tainted an American Icon

Kmart's Ten Deadly Sins: How Incompetence Tainted an American Icon

by Marcia Layton Turner

Advance Praise "It’s not a pretty story, but it is a well-told story of the decline and fall of Kmart, the discount chain that pioneered the new category that brought us Wal-Mart. Every would-be entrepreneur should read this cautionary tale." –Al Ries, Chairman, Ries & Ries "A well-written comparative analysis of why Kmart failed and Wal-Mart continues to thrive. The management lessons found... (more)

The Wal-Mart Way Not Sam's Way: An Associates View from Inside the Stores

The Wal-Mart Way Not Sam's Way: An Associates View from Inside the Stores

by Julie Pierce

Among the merchandise, files and customers at Walmart are the associates. The people who greet the customers and keep the shelves stocked. This book looks into the lives of the people this company will forever be connected to, like it or not. This is the warehouse, the truck driver and the system keeping count of it all. This is a written view from the inside. It takes an in depth look at associates,... (more)

Shelfari Book Activity

Tags: so i read like im 40

by F. Scott Fitzgerald

by George Orwell

by Jean-Claude Suares, Ambrose Bierce

by Dan Brown

Or, the Children's Crusade: A Duty Dance with Death

by Kurt Vonnegut

by Anthony Burgess

by George Orwell

by John Dicker

by Homer H. Hickam

by Sam Walton

by Anthony Bianco

by Laura Rowley

by Joanna Bourke

by William H. Marquard

by Derek Curtis Bok

by Watty Piper

How the World's Most Powerful Company Really Works--and How It's Transforming the American Economy

by Charles Fishman

by Ishmael Beah

by Marcia Layton Turner

by Julie Pierce