Careless People - Sarah Wynn-Williams

 Sub-title: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism

Sarah was the Director of Public Policy for Facebook from 2011 until she was fired in 2017.  She was "in the room where it happened" managing Facebook's strategies for expanding across the world.  And that strategy was horrific, the attitude and goals of its leaders being to put Facebook everywhere regardless of the impact on people.  She is under a gag order from the courts as Meta (Facebook) used her for violating her severance agreement.

I found the memoir disturbing - both as a portrait of a company run by the next generation and as a revealing, likely unintentional self-portrait.  It was strange to be invited into this world of power, unbelievable money, the edge of innovation and a new technology.  Sarah claims to have been part of an idealistic team of people intent on bringing access and connection to everyone on the globe.  Then she describes how they deviated from that goal, succumbing to the intoxication of controlling an unbridled tool.  Her story is convincing and disgusting.  What I grappled with was her staying in the middle of it; hanging on to the feeling she could make a difference being on the inside.  

She grapples with the second in command, a woman named SS who preached the rights of women to work and have a family while demanding 24/7 working hours - to the point of Sarah choosing to send an email while she was in labor with her first child.  Insane acceptance of a destructive culture.  

As of July 2026, Sarah was still prohibited from promoting the book. If you can find it, read it.

Published: 2025  Read: September 2026  Genre: Memoir

I Believe in a Thing Called Love - Maurene Goo

 I forgot to bring a book for my flight and picked this up in the circulating book bin at John C Campbell Folk School.  It's the story of a high school senior, accomplished in every way except having a boyfriend.  She uses the plot line of every "K-drama" - Korean romance and romance comedies - as a blueprint for overcoming her insecurities to attract the boy she falls for.  Interesting to learn about a new genre and it filled up most of the plane ride home.

Published: 2017 Read: September 2026. Genre: YA

The Man Who Turned Into Himself - David Ambrose

 

I was looking over the way-too-many books I have and couldn't remember reading this one before. It's a short,clever, slightly disturbing novel about a man who experiences a split personality after a traumatic event - or does he?  Are there really alternate realities as predicted by quantum mechanics? Are we living an infinite number of different lives and can we go back and forth between them?  A good read.

Quotes: 

"The point I'm making...is that you can never get back to where you were. That's the one frustration, you can't go back. The universe you want to change goes on just the way it would have."

Published: 1993  Read: August 2026  Genre: Fiction

I'm Not Rappaport - Herb Gardner

 

I picked this up at a used book sale out in Carefree last spring and finally got around to reading it in a couple of nights.  Written 20 years ago I was pleasantly surprised how the theme centered around the lives of a pair of older men surviving in a world where they are largely irrelevant. It was different to read a play, to imagine the characters and see pictures of the actors that performed the play on Broadway.  An enjoyable read and a thoughtful commentary on aging.

Quotes:

page 47 - [Nat's lecture to Danforth on older people] "you collect old furniture, old cars, old pictures everything but old people. Bad souvenirs, they talk too much. Even quiet, they tell you too much; they look like the future and you don't want to know. Who are these people, these oldies, this strange race? They're not my type, put them with their own kind, a building, a town, put them someplace. You idiots, don't you know?  One day you too will join this weird tribe. Yes, Mr Chairman, you will get old; I hate to break the news. And if you're frightened now, you'll be terrified then. The problem is not that life is short it's but that it's very long; so you better have a policy....don't you understand? The old people, their the survivors, they know something, they haven't just stayed late to the party....you tell him that he is unnecessary, that he is a sin, that is a sin against life, that is abortion at the other end."

Published: 1986  Read: August 2026  Genre: Play