Aron 2 Blue

Reads like a who-dunnit thriller. It's pretty amazing that Lewis can make derivatives and credit-default swaps engaging and understandable.I found it a really good survey of what got us into the 'great recession'. It's told from the perspective of the people who foresaw the collapse, and bet that it would happen by shorting stocks or buying investments on the other side. Some of them eventually understood that they were enabling the system by providing a market for some of these credit default swaps. Recommended for those who have an interest in this area!

Young-adult fiction where young adults kill each other in a game televised to the oppressed masses. Privation and post-apocalypse. What more could you desire in a SF novel? Not spectacularly deep, but I'm interested in finding out how an oppressive system maintained for 75 years gets challenged in the next book. It's quite violent, with kids killing kids, and I'm mildly surprised that I've not seen it mentioned in the media with our current gun-violence focus. Only 4 posts in 2012 - too bad. I had this sitting in 'drafts' for quite a while. I'm also hooking up to G+, let's see what happens.