The Crystal City - Orson Scott Card (The Tales of Alvin Maker, Bk. 6)

 Totally thought this was the final book in the series. Turns out, it's just not finished yet. Card has been going in so many directions I really hope he come back to this series soon.  I'd love to see it keep going.  It is really a fun ride.  

The NFT Handbook - Matt Fortnow & QuHarrison Terry

 Glad I read this but definitely not "investing" in NFTs! This is NOT an investment, this is a speculation or even "day" trading.  But there is no long term "growth" anticipated out of this system.  Let's be real here: NFT's are virtual beanie babies.  So NFTs as far as making money goes are nothing more than a fad, however they are great as a means of digital media like books or songs/albums and as a safe way to create a sweepstakes/promotion/celebrity fundraiser.  There are absolutely many useful ways to use NFTs for limited release digital media and as a novel way to help people reach their fan on a personal level, but as a collectable, I'm very skeptical.  Of course, the book must act like that's the primary use because if no one's buying, no one can sell, but the prices to "register" on the block chain are so high right now, I have a hard time justifying it for the average crafter/struggling artist/newbie.  Once the prices go down, eh, maybe.  

The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man - John Perkins

 This is an intense, and largely sad, book.  I wish I didn't have to say this, but every American and wannabe American should read this.  It's the kind of stuff you know is happening, but this book goes into specific details.  It is disgusting, infuriating and tragic, disappointing and has the begrudging ring of truth to it.  I knew Regan, Nixon, and Bush 2 were horrible men, but I didn't know that term also applied to Bush 1.  I know better now. The United States in in such a desperate need of an honorable leader right now. I haven't seen one in my lifetime. 

The author details the meddling, murder and financial enslavement he personally performed for the US government and then when his conscious finally caught up with him, the same acts done to his personal project trying to undo any of the damage he caused.  He watched his friends get murdered because they were honorable leaders who put the needs of their people first.  That's why this book is so frustrating because evil wins, and not in the deserving way.  

I believe every American should read this because demanding better of those we elect is the only solution.   We must demand that companies are held accountable for the utter destruction they cause at home and abroad and we certainly can't do that while the people in charge are all getting kickbacks from them.  Our whole system needs a few key safety measures implemented (computer-generated voting districts to end gerrymandering, publicly funded elections to end "favors" and lobbying, ranked choice voting).  That's the only way we stop being responsible for murdering so many thousands of people around the world. 

Alhoa from Hell - Richard Kadrey (Sandman Slim Series, Bk. 3)

 Fun!  The more I read this series, the more I like it.  It's still not a wide appealing book, but my previous recommendations stand of if you like Hellblazer or Supernatural, you'll probably go for this!

Don't Die Broke - Margaret A. Malaspina

 This book wasn't as useful now as I'd thought it would be.  It focuses on the steps to take when transitioning into retirement, which isn't too terribly useful to me at this point.  The book was written about 20 years ago ( I would guess) and I believe much of it is outdated in terms of times and numbers and amounts. (Not that I was going to remember any of those specific details anyway.) However, the one big take-home idea throughout the whole book that did and will stick with me is to keep your options open.  Many of the decisions made at the beginning cannot be changed later, so throughly review all your options, possibly even with a lawyer or professional, before ever doing anything.

Cryptocurrency: Trading and Trading Strategies - Michael Scott

 Nice overview.  Crap details.  Not a how-to book, more of a primer. 

It Came from Something Awful: How a Toxic Troll Army Accidentally Memed Donald Trump into Office - Dale Beran

 Wooooo, doggie! This one's a doozy! The books title is accurate, it did come from something awful, figuratively and literally as this is the name of an early shit-post site.  This is a phenomenal overview of the worst the internet has to offer, at least on whole-sale markets (it's not the most deranged stuff out there but it's the worst a normal person would encounter).  I cannot recommend this book enough for everyone except the tech literate people who were involved in this from the beginning.  I'm of the age that I heard about or saw a lot of this happen, but I didn't quite know how they all strung together.  This book connects the dots for you and the picture it draws is both amazing and frightening.

I'll use one example to illustrate:  Pizza Gate.  I'm sure most everyone has heard of it but . . . WHY??! How did this become a thing? Why are the easily influenced convinced there are democrats sexually abusing and/or eating children in the basement of a pizza parlor?! Where did this insane idea come from and why does anyone think it's real? This book spends a good time on the details and you should read it for them, but it boils down to crass people on the internet getting around auto-flagging of banned topics, like child porn, by abbreviating it to CP. Then making unappealing jokes about other things that could have the same abbreviation, like cheese pizza.  Hillary Clinton's hacked/leaked emails discuss ordering cheese pizza (literal pizza) and the scuzzy internet trolls joke about her ordering CP.  Some sad sap that doesn't understand trolling, sarcasm, or shit posting sees the reference and believes this is a legitimate conspiracy instead of (mostly) horrible people making a really untasteful joke.  Sad Sap spreads the word and suddenly a whole cohort of people who grew up without the critical judgement skills necessary to evaluate the legitimacy of what they read on the internet are frothing at the mouth to stop the sexual assault of hundreds or thousand of children in the non-existent basement of a pizza restaurant.   (The peak irony is that many of these people are the same ones who monetarily support the Catholic church, which DOES have a history of sexually assaulting children.)  Spoiler alert: someone actually stormed this restaurant loaded down with a lot of firepower to "save the children" only to discover there is no basement/backroom.

And this situation happens over and over again, until we get to the point of actually influencing elections! Fascinating. Sad. Bizarre. Fluid.  This book really should be read by everyone for basic on education on the sociology of internet culture.