Have the Men Had Enough? (Margaret Foster)

This is a beautifully constructed portrait of a family coming to terms with (or failing to) dementia within the family. After a lifetime caring for the family, when the mother/ grandmother needs caring for herself, what is the best approach the family can take? The characters demonstrate the range of emotions and responses that arise in this family challenge – is the quality of grandma’s life more important than her safety? Is the damage to other people outweighed by her happiness? Who benefits, who gains, who loses, who cares? Rather than a purely clinical discussion of dementia, this book celebrates the joys of the patient’s former youth and glory, and combines this with a perspective on some of the more ridiculous aspects of the current situation. The tone conveys the seriousness of the problem, but allows a light-hearted style to convey the message with great effect.

This book draws attention to the questions and challenges that families face with caring for dementia. The characters’ different values and beliefs highlight the conflicts that will arise over caring, comforting and controlling both the sick and healthy within a family. If you are facing this challenge, or fear this for the future, read and share this book with your family – this may give you some reference-point to start the discussions.

The Periodic Table (Primo Levi)

Loosely structured around a selection of the chemical elements, this book is a collection of short stories from the author’s memories of a life working in chemistry, together with a couple of pieces of fiction. The book starts with a long rambling chapter about relations in Piedmont before the war, a collection of memories of people from the author’s past. This is a huge barrier to the reader, but the book becomes much more readable after this opening. Primo Levi is famous for his accounts of Auschwitz and afterwards (If This Is a Man (and) The Truce), and this book continues the theme but mostly focuses elsewhere in his life. The painful march towards Auschwitz is described over several years of people’s ignorance, lack of information and unwillingness to be informed. In working for the army in 1942, he recognises that he could have helped the German war effort and admits that he dismissed this notion, focussing on his desire to prove his worth to people who had labelled him inferior. Later chapters tackle the re-appearance of former captors in business many years later, and the dilemma Levi faced in dealing with them.

These are critical thoughts from a survivor of Europe’s darkest hour, and his commentary on his own actions calls for self-reflection. But the deep nature of this thinking does not make this a great book. There are supreme highs followed by long rambling sections that detract from the overall story. The fictional short stories fit with the book’s title, but fail to add to the overall message. Five stars for the message, three for the writing.

Man's Search for Meaning (Victor Frenkl)

I was surprised by the small size when I received this book from Amazon. I had heard so much about the book, and expected a great deal from it. Compared to most books in the self-help section, this book is tiny, but Frenkl conveys his story clearly and succinctly in 150 pages. Assuming that his readers will have read or heard the more gruesome details of the concentration camp, Frenkl describes the daily reality of a prisoner's experience. With poignant moments scattered throughout the first (autobiographic) part of the book, he describes how people survived, supported others and died in that world. As a psychologist, he also tells the reader how and why he and others made some of their choices during that time. On its own this is a gripping read.

In the second part of the book, he relates this experience to his own form of psychology - logotherapy. This form of psychology focuses on man's search for the purpose and meaning in life. This part of the book becomes quite academic at times, but is well worth persevering with, to put the earlier part into current context. This is a classic - 5 stars.

The Wisdom of Crowds (James Surowiecki)

The author maintains the stance that the wisdom of the collective is better than the wisdom of the individual, and gives a number of social and psychological experiments to demonstrate this. He identifies three keys that lead to improving wisdom, or at least better decisions - diversity, independence and decentralisation, and again gives plenty of examples. But he then destroys his argument with numerous examples of the ignorance of the collective – from stock market bubbles to science and business. Whenever information is shared and herd instinct takes over, it seems that the crowd loses wisdom (for more of this see Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds).

So the book raises some interesting ideas, but stutters to an unsatisfactory close, providing a whole set of conflicting information. Good in parts, but a stronger conclusion would have helped. Some of the most interesting ideas seek to capture the wisdom of the collective in a way that helps with decision-making, but doesn't actually make the decision. In organisations, using internal markets or bets on new products seems to generate better feedback rather than just asking people - removing the fear of telling the boss bad news. Seeking diversity, and using information differently to the herd, improves the value of information in decision-making compared to copying everyone else.