“American Sniper” is a thrilling eyewitness account of the Iraq war that only Chris Kyle can tell. It’s not one of the better written war memoirs and you’re not going to get a ton of history, but it will hold your attention and give you a unique perspective from a sniper’s point of view.

As every good war memoir does, Kyle’s story starts with his life prior to military service. This gives the reader a frame of reference. It’s harder to relate to someone who is lining up bomb-strapped insurgets in his crosshairs if you don’t understand who he was when he was an underpaid ranch hand sleeping in a frigid shack in Texas while he was figuring out what to do with his life.

Special Forces and SEALs are in a class of their own. Even rank-and-file service members don’t really understand them. Kyle’s account gives just enough of a glimpse into the life to understand why SEALs have such a high divorce rate and how demons can follow a man home from war.

“American Sniper” is not all about 1,000 yard headshots, urban warfare, and IEDs. I enjoyed when Kyle’s wife, Taya, chimed in. These are the moments that are unfortunately missing from too many historical accounts of war. Her words gave me insight into the perspective that my now-wife, Lindsey, must have had while we were dating during my own deployment to Iraq. The importance of maintaining your relationship with your partner and your children during and in between deployments must not be understated to any young man who is considering enlisting.

There are plenty of asides throughout the book that talk about the weapons and vehicles to keep the reader engaged. Veterans and civilians alike will enjoy hearing about the human elements that take over when equipment invariably fails. My favorite was when the SEAL team’s vehicles were dropped by helo outside an enemy air base and immediately became stuck in deep mud and became immobilized while under fire.

There are some indications that Kyle almost certainly embellished and exaggerated parts of his story, although interestingly enough, all the events in question are non-combat related. However, in no way do these indiscretions detract from his service to his country and to his brothers in arms.

If you enjoy this book, you should check out the 2014 film of the same name with Bradley Cooper. It’s one of the better movies about our current conflicts. The movie couldn’t resist taking some liberties with the original story, such as inventing a fictional competing enemy sniper, but all in all it is a good watch.

You can get a free 30-day trial to Audible as well as two free audiobooks that are yours to keep. Audible is an affordable way to enjoy your favorite books and discover new ones when you can’t make time to sit down and read a physical book. You’ll also help out The Pilanesberg Project when you follow my link.

I’m actually not a science fiction fan at all. This is the only Stephen King work I’ve ever read, although I’ve seen a number of movies that were adapted from his novels. His superb character development, the way he builds the story arc, and his attention to detail in creating the settings have persuaded me to start exploring some of his other writings. Derry, Maine feels like it’s a real place that you could actually visit and recognize when you get there based on King’s descriptions.

The narration by Steven Weber is top-notch. It is obvious that he rehearsed and was really into it because his delivery and poise is flawless. The sheer number of characters would make narrating this novel a formidable challenge, but Weber makes them sound believable.

At times, I felt like the narration was a little too intense, which left me with the uncomfortable feeling of being confused as to whether I was watching a movie or listening to someone read the book.

At 48 hours long, you are getting a lot of value for your money compared to a typical audiobook, most of which are well under 20 hours. Due to its length, I would suggest listening to it in at least 30-minute blocks, otherwise it will take so long to finish that you might forget important details from earlier in the book.

I give my students an interest questionnaire at the start of every semester to give me some insight into their backgrounds, motivations, and interests. One of the questions is about their favorite book. I was pleasantly surprised to see that two of my students who proudly declared themselves to be non-readers had indicated that “It” was theirs. At 1,138 pages for the paperback and considering the fact that this wasn’t a book that was assigned in school, I think it’s fair to say that these students just haven’t found enough other books that interest them.

I really look forward to listening to “It” again in a few years after I have read some of King’s other works, perhaps on a long solo road trip. I’m sure that some of my perspectives will have changed and that I will pick up on new details that I missed the first time.

You can get a free 30-day trial to Audible as well as two free audiobooks that are yours to keep. Audible is an affordable way to enjoy your favorite books and discover new ones when you can’t make time to sit down and read a physical book. You’ll also help out The Pilanesberg Project when you follow my link.

One of my “laws of life” is that debt is a form of slavery and that you should choose to live in freedom. “The Total Money Makeover” by Dave Ramsey tells you how to do this. This isn’t a theoretical book about how to think and grow rich through the power of attraction or some other metaphysical BS. Dave teaches you how to break the chains step by step. If you forever change how you think about money – specifically, debt – then this book has done its job.

Just because something is simple doesn’t mean it’s easy. The concept of not spending more than you make and saving for emergencies is not a difficult concept to understand, but by the numbers, Americans struggle with this. I don’t know how “The Total Money Makeover” isn’t required reading in every high school in America.

Wouldn’t we live with less stress, have stronger marriages (finances are the number one cause of divorce), be able to change our family trees, and be able to give more generously to others if more of us followed Dave’s words? “Don’t be normal. Normal is broke – be weird”.

Through an easy to understand six-step system that he calls “working the baby steps”, Dave will teach you money management strategies that lead to financial independence and the ability to live and give like no one else. You’ll learn how to see exactly where your money is going when you create a zero-based budget and give every dollar a name. My father always said that money goes where you tell it to go, regardless of whether you’re aware of where you’re telling it to go.

There is a saying that goes something like “you can have anything you want in life if you just help enough other people get what they want”. Dave Ramsey has done exactly that. After going bankrupt and losing everything due to overleveraging a series of real estate deals when he was in his early 20’s, Dave started his financial coaching business from a folding card table in his living room. He’s now worth about $60 million and is responsible for helping more people get out of debt and become financially free than any other single person who I’m aware of.

The concept of debt freedom is about more than a single book. Start with “The Total Money Makeover” and then check out the other books that he and his team have written. His podcast, “The Dave Ramsey Show”, is a bit formulaic if you’re a long-time listener, but it’s an excellent accountability partner for your journey to debt freedom and also teaches general financial literacy. Over five million people have taken his Financial Peace University course. One in three high schools has used his Foundations in Personal Finance: High School Edition curriculum.

I find Dave Ramsey to be a trustworthy person who has the heart of a teacher and genuinely wants to help people. I love his advice for getting out of debt, but I think his investing advice of just buying four different classes of mutual funds without regard to what the market is doing is too one-dimensional and limiting. To not get out of the way of an oncoming freight train or to dismiss the value of purchasing a well-researched single stock at the right time is shortsighted. It’s kind of like how Michael Jordan was the best basketball player of all time, but was below-average at baseball.

The good news is that if you work his system for getting out of debt, you can put your most powerful asset – your income – to work for you and invest how you see fit.

You can get a free 30-day trial to Audible as well as two free audiobooks that are yours to keep. Audible is an affordable way to enjoy your favorite books and discover new ones when you can’t make time to sit down and read a physical book. You’ll also help out The Pilanesberg Project when you follow my link.

“Killing Kennedy” is a well-researched account of the events that lead up to the 1963 assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy and the political turmoil of the times.

O’Reilly describes the assassination in gripping detail. This event happened 20 years before I was born, but the way O’Reilly drew me in made it feel like something I had lived through. The listener also gets enough of Kennedy’s personal life to put his assassination into context. O’Reilly goes to great lengths to show the side of Kennedy not seen by the public.

I’ve never been particularly interested in JFK and probably wouldn’t have dedicated the time to sit down and read a book about him, but I’m glad I checked this out. After listening to this, I would consider this work to be a good JFK or Cold War “starter book”. I learned a lot about what went on behind the closed doors of the Kennedy administration. His presidency, and particularly his character as a man, is a complicated legacy. As always, it’s the little pieces of history such as Jackie noticing the wet footprints on the concrete decking of the White House pool from one of her husband’s mistresses that never seem to make their way into the textbooks that have always drawn me in.

O’Reilly and Dugard take an objective look at the assassination and present evidence without steering the listener to any particular conclusion. While O’Reilly is solidly conservative and has been known to be rather bellicose with his political opponents over the years on Fox News, I didn’t detect any partisan bias in his writing.

If you’re hoping to hear about some of the more radical conspiracy theorists about who killed JFK, this isn’t the book for you. This book is based almost 100% on the Warren Commission’s report. There is no significant mention or analysis of the many other plausible theories. Personally, I believe that Oswald was indeed the lone shooter, however I think there is credible evidence to conclude that he didn’t act alone in orchestrating the assassination.

My wife and I listened to this book in the car on the way back to Ohio from a vacation in Hilton Head. I usually feel the need to take a break after listening to nonfiction audiobooks for more than a couple of hours during such trips, but O’Reilly’s “Killing” series have always been an exception. “Killing Kennedy” was no exception – it took us through the mountains of Virginia and West Virginia and really made the time fly.

I consume dozens of audiobooks per year, and I don’t hesitate to say that Bill O’Reilly is the best narrator I’ve ever listened to. His stentorian voice maintains your attention throughout the entire book and draws you into the story – and, like every good storyteller does – he leaves you on the edge of your seat wondering what’s going to happen next. I was disappointed when I listened to some of his other audiobooks when I learned that he had only recorded the foreword to these. Fortunately, he narrates all of “Killing Kennedy”.

You can get a free 30-day trial to Audible as well as two free audiobooks that are yours to keep. Audible is an affordable way to enjoy your favorite books and discover new ones when you can’t make time to sit down and read a physical book. You’ll also help out The Pilanesberg Project when you follow my link.

“Kitchen Confidential” is one man’s odyssey through his career in the industry, from dishwasher to executive chef and television producer. The author warns us early on that he is going to tell the truth – the good, the bad, and the just plain beautiful.

As the subtitle of the book states, this is an uncensored look into the culinary underbelly of American restaurants. The casual American restaurant-goer doesn’t see the fatalism, hard drugs, or the transiency of the workforce from the “front of the house” (the dining room side).

I’ve always believed that everyone should work at both a retail establishment as well as in a restaurant at some point in their lives to learn how to treat one another better.

Some of the stories are downright hilarious, and if I hadn’t worked at several different restaurants in the past, I’m not sure I would have believed them myself. I’ve worked with some of the types of characters he describes in this book.

Bourdain writes in the coarse language of someone who has come up in a professional kitchen. I’ve never seen any of his t.v. shows, but he strikes me as a very authentic person who has exceedingly high standards and little patience for incompetence or laziness, yet is willing to go to the mat and mentor someone when he recognizes raw determination and talent.

As with the other audiobooks I’ve reviewed, “Kitchen Confidential” wouldn’t have the same impact in printed form. It feels like Anthony Bourdain is right next, telling you his story, while you’re doing whatever it is you’re doing while you listen to this book. He not only has a great voice for narration, but his sincerity comes through.

I couldn’t help but empathize with the wear and tear and the many lows that Bourdain (much of it self-inflicted). The reader gets the impression that .

This is a must-read for anyone working in or connected to the restaurant industry, but it’s the type of book that anyone would enjoy. I left with a better appreciation for what goes on behind the scenes at a restaurant and among the pirate crews that run the kitchens. While this isn’t an instruction manual – there are no recipes anywhere in it –, I learned a lot about various foods he mentioned and researched them further. The next time I’m in a French restaurant, I’m definitely ordering a medium rare côte de boeuf.

If you enjoy “Kitchen Confidential”, you would also like his follow-up book, “Medium Raw”, although the former was more captivating in my opinion.

You can get a free 30-day trial to Audible as well as two free audiobooks that are yours to keep. Audible is an affordable way to enjoy your favorite books and discover new ones when you can’t make time to sit down and read a physical book. You’ll also help out The Pilanesberg Project when you follow my link.