Book-Review

Another book that I recently received for review from my friends at PackT Publishing was Getting Started with Graph Query Language (GQL) by Ricky Gun, Jason Zhang, and Yuri Simione.

The subtitle is The complete guide to designing, querying, and managing graph databases with GQL.

I’ve worked with a number of graph-based databases over the years and I was interested to see where GQL is heading.

SQL Server Graph

In 2017, graph databases were all the rage, and so I wasn’t surprised when the SQL Server team decided to implement graph functionality within SQL Server.

2025-08-22

Sometimes I’m sent books to review and I just don’t get around to it fast enough. This book was one of those. Why we argue and how to stop: A Therapist’s Guide to Navigating Disagreements, Managing Emotions, and Creating Healthier Relationships by Jerry Manney .

I found this book quite interesting.

Early on, Jerry notes that journaling is important because memory is unreliable. Jerry said I learned a long time ago that one of the key characteristics of a knowledgeable and successful person is not how much they can remember, but whether they have a method or system for accessing important and relevant information when they need it. I’m certainly learning that more as I get older.

2025-07-13

My friends at PackT recently sent me a review copy of fellow MVP Greg Deckler’s third edition of Learn Microsoft Power BI . It’s not released yet but is available for pre-order.

Production quality and additional resources

The book is written well and the copy and tech editing seem well handled.

I was particularly impressed to see that Art Tennick was a tech reviewer. I regularly mention Art’s books. I like the way he presents recipe style books. He did it with MDX and again with DAX. Many people don’t want a detailed coverage of a language, just a series of recipes on how to use it. That’s what some of Art’s books provide.

2025-07-01

I recently read another Mandarin Companion book called Great Expectations Part 1 adapted by John Pasden from the Charles Dickens original book.

I love these books.

John Pasden is well-known to anyone who’s been learning Mandarin for any length of time. He was one of the presenters at ChinesePod over the years. He set up a company called Mandarin Companion that produces graded readers.

If you haven’t seen graded readers (in any language), they are reading books that limit the scope of the target language to a particular set of words (or in this case characters).

2025-06-27

I was intrigued to see a book called Don’t Give Your Work Away for Free by Thaddeus Cooper and Dr Frederick Von Greensburg. I thought I should check it out.

The authors start out by discussing how employment typically works today. You have a timeline to do work, you go there for the time, and you are paid for going there.

While I have done that sort of work over the years, it’s certainly not how I prefer to work. I far prefer a project value basis where I determine with the client what needs to be done, work out the value that it will provide, and provide them with a price to achieve that outcome. How and when I get that done is then up to me.

2025-06-23

I decided I’d like to have a greater understanding of some medical topics. One of the areas I’ve been looking into is Cardiology.

I was looking around to find some books that explain it and I stumbled upon A Concise Summary of Cardiology by Kevin Carson .

For a tough topic, I was surprised that the book was so short.

The problem that I found with the book is that it’s not really for me. Instead of explaining the concepts, it’s really a how to guide for people who are studying for work in cardiology.

2025-05-26

Over the years, one area that I have a great interest in, and yet I think gets nowhere near the right amount of attention is API design. So I was really interested to hear fellow MVP Valerio De Sanctis’ ideas in the new book Building Web APIs With ASP.NET Core .

API Design and Standards

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to work with poorly designed APIs. It affects me when working with data, but also affects almost every aspect of computing.

2025-05-14

Over the years, I’ve spent quite a bit of time teaching core computing concepts. When I was teaching at universities, there were a few “go-to” books that I liked to use. One such book was Structured Computer Organization by Andrew Tanenbaum and Todd Austin. I recently noticed that it was now in its 6th edition, so I thought it was time to revisit it.

The book was designed to be used in university courses. I’m not sure what the current setup is, but I noticed on Amazon that it was a crazy high price, yet it was also available for direct download from a university GitHub repository. I couldn’t seem to work out if that was intentional or not, so I won’t link to it.

2025-05-03

I’ve known Soheil Bakhshi for a while now and was keen to review the second edition of his new book: Expert Data Modeling with Power BI . Our friends at PackT sent me a review copy.

Data Modeling

The data modeling that’s needed for good Power BI outcomes is something that’s dear to my heart, and I was keen to see what Soheil had to say, and where I agreed or disagreed.

2025-05-01

I’ve been a fan of Seth Godin for such a long time. I recently read Small is the New Big: And Other (Little) Ideas That Change Everything . Once again, I’m glad I read it.

One thing I’ve learned over decades of giving presentations, is that you can present all the detail you want, but the thing that the attendees will remember, are the stories and anecdotes that you deliver. Seth is a master of story telling.

2025-04-29