I had a new years resolution to Read More Books this past year and actually read around 20 books this year. Out of those books here is a quick list of some of my favorites from the past year that I really enjoyed.
Stillness Is the Key
This book was probably one of the most impactful books I read this year. It walks through how the great and the good spent time alone and in thought in order to make their most momentous decisions. It really inspired me to take 30 minutes a day to disconnect to journal and meditate.
GCHQ 2
I love these puzzle books. I spent many hours on planes and on the couch walking through this book and trying to figure out these puzzles. I am looking forward to the thrid installment that will hopefully come out shortly.
Zero Trust Networks: Building Secure Systems in Untrusted Networks
Zero trust has been an overused buzzword for the last few years in security. This book is the ground truth about what zero trust really is and how to implement it correctly. This is a must-read for anyone in security.
People-Centric Security: Transforming Your Enterprise Security Culture
This book was a great reminder that you cant fix security in any organization through technology alone and you have to concentrate on how to get people at all levels of the organization to care about security.
The Moscow Rules: The Secret CIA Tactics That Helped America Win the Cold War
This was a really interesting, entertaining and quick read. Here are the Moscow Rules:
- Assume nothing.
- Never go against your gut.
- Everyone is potentially under opposition control.
- Do not look back; you are never completely alone.
- Go with the flow, blend in.
- Vary your pattern and stay within your cover.
- Lull them into a sense of complacency.
- Do not harass the opposition.
- Pick the time and place for action.
- Keep your options open.
Our Man in New York: The British Plot to Bring America into the Second World War
This book is about how England used the media in the 1940s to change American’s opinions about entering world war 2 by doing everything from bribing a radio psychic to predict Hitler’s death to slightly changing public opinion polling questions to make it look like Americans were more open to joining the war.
Gray Day: My Undercover Mission to Expose America’s First Cyber Spy
This is a great story about how Eric O’Neill and the role he played in hunting down Robert Hanssen and how he hacked his bosses Palm III to download and decode its encrypted contents.
