Steve Jobs, Isaacson - B +

                                          This is a superb book about an extraordinary man. I started this when it came out in 2012 and put it down (actually - removed it from the carousel on my Kindle Fire). The reason was that I was totally disgusted by his personal conduct, which requires hundreds of descriptive adjectives to try and summarize.  Suffice it to say, I wasn't interested in reading about a guy like that. Marcella recently suggested I give it another try and I'm glad I did.  Once you get through his early years (that is not to say he ever mellowed) and get to some of his accomplishments, his genius, skills, vision, and focus dazzle the mind. His founding of Apple and his commitment to his philosophies about what a computer company should be made him world famous before he was thirty. He was eventually fired at the company he founded and then floundered through NeXT and stumbled onto Pixar.  It was at Pixar where he developed the maturity and skills that would carry him through his second run at Apple. What he wrought is legendary, and Isaacson says that 100 years from now he will be remembered the way we remember Edison and Ford. Although there has been much hyperbole about the man and his recent untimely death, I agree with the author. Jobs himself wanted to emulate Edwin Land and Walt Disney and create lasting businesses and cultures. I can't help but think about how much more successful American businesses would be if their executives had a fraction of his focus on the quality, and his involvement in all phases, of  the products they were creating, building, and selling.  Perhaps it is naive to think that for-profit businesses could be that focused on quality without compromise, but he and Apple certainly made plenty of profits.  This is  a great  book, and I  believe the world is certainly a better place because of Steve Jobs.