Scott J. Pearson’s Book Review

The Unwritten Rules of Managing Up: Project Management Techniques from the Trenches

By Scott J. Pearson | July 11, 2022July 28, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

“Managing up” is a relatively new concept in the business world. It refers to taking care of your boss’ and senior management’s needs as a part of your duties. Managing down, presumably, refers to managing subordinates, but managing up, not just managing down, has a significant impact on one’s career trajectory. Brownlee seeks to explore this concept by describing what this looks like pragmatically as a newer employee. Most employees have encountered difficult bosses at…

Biography-Memoir

War & Me: A Memoir by Faleeha Hassan

By Scott J. Pearson | July 9, 2022July 9, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

Iraq has encountered consistent upheaval for the past half-century. Most Americans know parts of that story from the news. What most Americans, like myself, don’t know is what that story looks like on the ground, in individual lives. They don’t appreciate how US policy has affected common life, mainly because they haven’t come into contact with an Iraqi. Instead, prejudice, bigotry, and/or cultural bias tends to fill that void. To address that problem, Hassan has…

Healthcare History Science

The Gene: An Intimate History

By Scott J. Pearson | July 4, 2022July 4, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

Genetics is a field of biomedical research that is both in motion and influential over our daily lives. It promises to help millions afflicted with horrific disease, yet it could be poised to change (or unravel?) human life as we seek to write our own destinies in DNA. Real action in this field has only occurred in the last 200 years, starting with Gregor Mendel and accelerating in the early twentieth century. Mukherjee, an oncologist…

Healthcare Research-Education

Personalizing Precision Medicine: A Global Voyage from Vision to Reality

By Scott J. Pearson | July 4, 2022July 4, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

This book has sat in my to-read stack for some time. I finally picked it up, and I’m glad I did. I love reading stories about the progress of medical research, the field I work in (specifically translational research). This book focuses on how medicine is evolving, especially zeroing in on in its business aspects as well as its international impacts. Even after the pandemic, precision medicine stands poised to provide more effective treatments in…

Fiction-Stories Indie Kids

The Bridge of Little Jeremy

By Scott J. Pearson | June 29, 2022June 29, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

Little Jeremy is a 13-year-old young man from Paris. He enjoys painting and the visual arts. He is homeschooled because of a heart condition. His mother works hard at a nursing home to support their family, and his father died previously in war. Little Jeremy and his dog Leon stay home for most of the day, but explore the downtown area around their apartment flat near Notre Dame cathedral. His mother is in a big…

Biography-Memoir History Leadership

A Man Named Robert: Lessons from the Life of America’s First Great Emancipator

By Scott J. Pearson | June 26, 2022September 24, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

This book attempts to accomplish two feats at once. First, it attempts to provide leadership lessons, and second, it tries to highlight the life history of Robert Carter III. (Ironically, the author and the biographical subject share the same last name. In this review, the author will be referred to as Dr. Carter while the subject, as just Carter.) Carter was a 18th-century Virginian planter who amassed great wealth around the time of the Revolutionary…

Humanities Religion-Philosophy Society

Reading Black Books: How African American Literature Can Make Our Faith More Whole & Just

By Scott J. Pearson | June 25, 2022June 25, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

The year 2022 resides in an era where there is renewed interest in the African American experience. That experience, of course, is incredibly rich and deep and historically spans Slavery, Reconstruction, the Harlem Renaissance, and the Civil Rights Movement. Atcho, a Christian pastor, brings out that spiritual depth by highlighting ten pieces of literature that illuminate the African American experience and the African American perspective on theology. This book in unabashedly in the Christian tradition.…

Fiction-Stories HIV/AIDS Humanities

The Great Believers: A Novel

By Scott J. Pearson | June 20, 2022June 20, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

I find the topic of HIV and AIDS absolutely fascinating – from the horrific sufferings of gay men to its origins in Haiti and Africa, from the elusiveness of the virus away from antivirals to biomedical efforts to limits its transmission, from AZT and HAART therapy to bone marrow transplants, from political stigma and oppression by GOP leaders to GOP efforts to cure the African epidemic, from the frustrating story of decades-long search for an…

Biography-Memoir Politics

Give Me Liberty: The True Story of Oswaldo Payá & His Daring Quest for a Free Cuba

By Scott J. Pearson | June 12, 2022June 12, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

Though politically informed, I am not particularly interested in political books in general, nor about Cuba in particular. My initial interest in this book stemmed from the accolades of its author. At first, the details of Cuban history confused me; then, it enlightened me; then, it moved me; finally, this book ended with my heart to yearn for the Cuban people. Hoffman weaves together many streams in this biography that centrally tells of one man’s…

Fiction-Stories Management-Business Mentoring

Starting Strong: A Mentoring Fable

By Scott J. Pearson | June 9, 2022July 24, 2022 by Scott J. Pearson

A key way to develop careers is forming a mentoring relationship. To facilitate this, a mentor has to gain specific skills, and a mentee, likewise, has to possess certain skills. Although this relationship can make a healthy career, not a lot of conversation about this topic exists, even in education circles. In this work, Zachary and Fischler try to examine traits that make mentoring relationships work. They do so through a fable (or allegory) that…