BILL ROBERTS MAKES CLANDESTINE DEMANDS ON ME

OK, here we go, Mr. Bill (who memed me demanding that I reveal to him, you and the world what I am reading)--

These are the current books I've either read or am working on and that I recommend.  You will learn something and your life will be enriched by every last one of them, I promise.

1.  The Smartest Investment Book You'll Ever Read by securities arbitration lawyer Daniel Solin.  Those who read and understand this book (which everyone should) will stop making stupid investment mistakes.

 2.  And for young people -- teens and young adults -- How to Invest $50 to $5000 by Nancy Dunnan.  This book will show your kids how to begin saving and investing when they get their first job.  It's a real winner.

3.  Lion in the White House:  The Life of Theodore Roosevelt by Aeda Donald.  This is an exceptionally good look at the presidency of Mr. Roosevelt, who it turns out, was one of our more brilliant leaders.

4.  Any (hopefully all) of the motivational books of John C. Maxwell.

5.  The Letters of Noel Coward edited by Barry Day who has studied and written about Mr. Coward for a number of years.  Noel Coward was one of our greatest playwrights, lyricists, actors, story tellers, social gad abouts, and a reasonably good musician and singer.  This voluminous book of letters written by him and to him gives a look into the times of Dorothy Parker, Winston Churchill, Daphne du Marier, and on and on.  I love the theater and contemporary literature so much that this book was especially interesting to me.

6.  A Boy Named Shel by Lisa Rogak.  Shel Silverstein first caught my eye as one of the first cartoonist for Playboy Magazine.  I was about 15.  And as time went on, he began chronicling his trips by using cartoons.  In his later years, he wrote and illustrated children's books.  Shel Silverstein was an enigma.

7.  Playboy Cover to Cover - the 50s. If you are a man who grew up in the '50s, you'll find this both fascinating and worthy.  This is a book and CD that provides every page of every magazine of Playboy from its first edition through December, 1959.  It cost $50 but I found it on sale for $25.

8.  Tony Bennett in the Studio is an autobiographical commentary of Mr. Bennett's life, but what is totally fascinating are his paintings, charcoals, pastels, and acrylics.  There are even a few pen and inks.  This man is, I believe, more talented as an artist than as a singer.

9.  Boone by Robert Morgan is probably the most concise and well-documented biography of Daniel Boone.  Absolutely fascinating and a great read.  Don't tell your sons, but Boone hated 'coon skin caps.  He wore beaver.

10, DON'T READ: How Starbucks Saved My Life: A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else by Michael Gates Gill. This guy's father was the famous Brandon Gill of The New Yorker Magazine.  Michael Gill worked for a New York advertising company.  He had a mid-life crisis, got himself a teeny-bopper girlfriend, got her pregnant, his wife left him, then the teeny-bopper left him, then he lost his job, then he was broke.

He couldn't find a job in advertising, so he took one waiting on the counter at a nearby Starbucks.  He's now trying to make a bundle on that experience with a book that is an embarrassment to him, his family...even, perhaps, the teeny-bopper and their "love child."

(Michael Gills' father Brandon is one of my literary heroes, having written one biographical sketch after another about interesting people and their fascinating lives.  His books, still available, are real winners.)

<<<=== And then there's my book, Bill Cherry's Galveston Memories, which I thought would be a competitor for the Nobel Prize for Literature.  It wasn't, but the dream remains.  Nevertheless, I'm proud to say thousands have been sold.

OK, Bill Roberts.  I want your book reports on my desk by Easter or you flunk Meme...no second chances, no extra credit.

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