by Brandon Quinn ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 1, 2023
A simple introduction to critical thinking and its practical benefits that readers will find easy to grasp.
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Writer, musician, business owner, and software engineer Quinn presents a beginner’s guide to using critical thinking as a way to better formulate plans and achieve goals.
The author begins his handbook by defining critical thinking as “the process of making observations, reasoning about those observations along with the available facts, and drawing conclusions based on the results of your reasoning process.” He goes on to differentiate between the four types of reasoning: deductive, inductive, abductive, and goal-based. Each section contains a case study of a specific scenario to demonstrate the appropriate use of each type of reasoning. For example, Quinn notes that scientists discovered—using what they already knew of physics—that Uranus’ orbit was very different from what it should have been, based on their calculations; they then used goal-based reasoning, which uses the “desired goal or outcome” as the starting point, to work out that an undiscovered planet was influencing Uranus’ orbit. Quinn also delves into factors that can influence critical thinking, such as preconceived biases that make one more inclined to accept logical fallacies, which may then be used “to avoid an undesirable conclusion.” Later, he offers a detailed discussion of creating “sub-goals” to achieve an end goal. The last two chapters are dedicated solely to case studies. The first tackles the critical thinking methods used by John Snow, the English scientist who discovered how cholera spread so rapidly in the mid-1800s; the second is a personal look at the author’s own experience inventing a quarter-tone technique for the saxophone and then writing and marketing a book about it.
All of Quinn’s examples prove to be easy to follow and are largely based in real-world scenarios. When he walks readers through mistakes and missteps that led to him being unable to graduate college in five years, or the various clues that should have tipped him off that he’d arrived at the wrong house for a party, he provides an accessible look into what critical thinking is and what its application means in daily life. The narrative tone is similarly approachable, with very little use of jargon. The few terms that may prove unfamiliar to beginners are in bold and are helpfully recapped in the final chapter, glossary-style. There are no illustrations or diagrams, however, which may disappoint visual learners. Quinn’s everyman approach to the different styles of reasoning is refreshing, as is his willingness to admit his own faults when employing them. For instance, while explaining his journey toward publishing his saxophone book, he concludes, “In essence, I did execute the critical thinking process successfully to create the book itself, but not on the business or other concerns of the project.” The abundance of personal anecdotes and historical examples keep things engaging for readers who value the practical over the theoretical. Overall, the book is a helpful overview of a range of skills that may prove helpful in readers’ everyday and professional lives.
A simple introduction to critical thinking and its practical benefits that readers will find easy to grasp.Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2023
ISBN: 9798864308332
Page Count: 232
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by David McCullough ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 16, 2025
A pleasure for fans of old-school historical narratives.
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New York Times Bestseller
Avuncular observations on matters historical from the late popularizer of the past.
McCullough made a fine career of storytelling his way through past events and the great men (and occasional woman) of long-ago American history. In that regard, to say nothing of his eschewing modern technology in favor of the typewriter (“I love the way the bell rings every time I swing the carriage lever”), he might be thought of as belonging to a past age himself. In this set of occasional pieces, including various speeches and genial essays on what to read and how to write, he strikes a strong tone as an old-fashioned moralist: “Indifference to history isn’t just ignorant, it’s rude,” he thunders. “It’s a form of ingratitude.” There are some charming reminiscences in here. One concerns cajoling his way into a meeting with Arthur Schlesinger in order to pitch a speech to presidential candidate John F. Kennedy: Where Richard Nixon “has no character and no convictions,” he opined, Kennedy “is appealing to our best instincts.” McCullough allows that it wasn’t the strongest of ideas, but Schlesinger told him to write up a speech anyway, and when it got to Kennedy, “he gave a speech in which there was one paragraph that had once sentence written by me.” Some of McCullough’s appreciations here are of writers who are not much read these days, such as Herman Wouk and Paul Horgan; a long piece concerns a president who’s been largely lost in the shuffle too, Harry Truman, whose decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan McCullough defends. At his best here, McCullough uses history as a way to orient thinking about the present, and with luck to good ends: “I am a short-range pessimist and a long-range optimist. I sincerely believe that we may be on the way to a very different and far better time.”
A pleasure for fans of old-school historical narratives.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781668098998
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
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by Steve Martin illustrated by Harry Bliss ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 17, 2020
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
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IndieBound Bestseller
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
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