The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2007, Hardcover)

In this book, Taleb's ideas on our limited abilities to understand history, future expectations, randomness, and our futile "need" to predict or forecast events are well thought out and insightful. However, his disjointed and self-aggrandizing writing style makes the book VERY difficult at times. I mean difficult as in, "Enough already, one more innane and obtuse quote or reference and I'll throw this horribly written crap in the trash," kind of difficult.

Yes, he is much more well read than I ever hope (or care) to be, but the constant name dropping and references to long-dead philosophers, mathematicians, politicians, and writers gets old quickly, and is more distracting than helpfull. In a few instances, he appears to be guilty of the same practices and poor logic that he (rightly) accuses most academics and business people of having. All said, I enjoy the book, but could do without his writing style. He critiques editors, but they may be able to help this book.