“Fish” Stocks Depleted To Near Extinction – Michael and Ian Celebrate

The Price of Fish: A New Approach to Wicked Economics and Better Decisions, the award-winning book by Michael Mainelli and Ian Harris, has almost completely sold out its English language first edition in the UK and USA, with just a few dozen copies left in the hands of the publishers. This matter is of little concern to Now and Z/Yen readers who would like a copy of The Price of Fish in Korean Hangul, or indeed to those prepared to wait for imminent releases in both Traditional Chinese and Simple Chinese.

In The Price of Fish, Michael and Ian propose a four ‘stream’ route to better understanding: through choice, economics, systems and evolution. Readers get a sense of the way the world really works and see problems from an integrated perspective that should help them make their own choices and decisions better.

The Price of Fish won the Gold Medal in the Finance, Investment and Economics category of the 2012 Independent Publisher Book Awards in the USA. IPPY awards recognize excellence and reward authors and publishers who “take chances and break new ground.” Medallists in the 2012 awards were chosen from over 5,000 entries.

For Now and Z/Yen readers keen to get hold of a first edition in English before it sells out, it can still be found in some bookshops and the remaining publisher stock is still trickling out, mostly through Amazon. Z/Yen also still has some copies for sale; if you would like to buy a signed copy, please contact Linda at Linda_cook@zyen.com.

Unlike real fish species, the written word never really becomes extinct these days, as The Price of Fish on Kindle Edition is and will remain available. Whether in physical or electronic form, The Price of Fish is a must for anyone’s summer reading pile (or e-pile).

Z/Yen Re-Kindles Interest In Clean Business Cuisine

Michael and Ian’s first book, Clean Business Cuisine – Now and Z/Yen is now available on Kindle. Observant Now and Z/Yen readers might have noticed that the name of this newsletter is the subtitle to the book. No-one at Z/Yen (not even Michael or Ian) seems to know which came first; only that both uses of the phrase have been around for years. As has, seemingly, Clean Business Cuisine, a novel modelled as a rediscovered ancient business text. It comprises a series of stories (or case studies) set around the workings of an ancient laundry and restaurant and its legendary proprietor, Chao Kli Ning. Each story is based on a simple duality, centralisation versus decentralisation, managing people or managing results, technology is wonderful or technology is useless.

On original release, in 2000, Clean Business Cuisine was extremely well received. It was a Sunday Times Book of the Week, described by D J Taylor as "highly entertaining . . . wonderfully daft . . . hilariously sophisticated stuff". Indeed, the lads’ heads swelled when Francis Beckett described it as “the 1066 and All That of management," only for their heads to shrink again when Accountancy Age claimed that it was "surprisingly funny considering it is written by a couple of accountants." These days, in their cynical dotage, they often describe Clean Business Cuisine as “an antidote to business books”.

Now Clean Business Cuisine is back. Released by Z/Yen as a complete Clean Business Cuisine on Kindle Edition, it is literally cheap as chips (£1.29) in this format. If you want to fork out for a physical copy, it is still available from more discerning outlets, not least Amazon or again if you want to buy a signed copy please contact Linda at linda_cook@zyen.com. In any format, Clean Business Cuisine is ideal summer reading and makes the perfect gift.

Michael and Ian’s Summer Reading Recommendations

Having been chained to its desk for days, writing the above puff about Michael and Ian’s books, Now and Z/Yen tentatively suggested that the fellas might like to recommend some other books to Now and Z/Yen readers. “Why would anyone want to read anything other than our books this summer?” was the incredulous reply. Still, with the natural caveat that all the following recommendations come as mere afterthoughts or supplements to their own books, here are Michael and Ian’s summer reading recommendations:

• Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. Both Michael and Ian have been fans of Kahneman’s work on decision-making psychology for decades. Now he has released this compendium of his life’s work in this highly readable and hugely informative book.
• Debt: The First 5,000 Years by David Graeber. An anthropologist’s take on economics, credit systems and their relationship with power through the ages. No easy read, this, but Michael and Ian both say that this book has changed the way they think about these important subjects.
• Acts of God and Man: Ruminations on Risk and Insurance by Michael R Powers. This book suggests that traditional insurance-type disaster risks might be an even more pernicious source of uncertainty in today's world than the more regularly trumpeted financial system risks. Michael has placed this one on Ian’s reading pile.
• Paper Promises: Money, Debt and the New World Order by Philip Coggan. This book covers money throughout the ages with particular focus on the impact that untrammelled paper money has had and might yet have since the collapse of Bretton Woods. Ian has placed this one on Michael’s reading pile.

Finally, for pure leisure:

• Michael recommends The Algebraist by Iain M Banks. Michael says, “I was drawn back to this book recently when I learnt of the sad, premature death of Iain M Banks.  This is a truly wonderful work of science fiction, where Dwellers live for millions of years inside gas giants.  Dweller societies try not to get involved with ‘Quick’, species like us, preferring ‘Slow’ species such as themselves.   Yet their dangerous playfulness contrasts adolescence with ennui.”
• Ian recommends Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubinstein. Ian says, “I have seed funded the proposed film of this book. Pelt smuggling, bank robbing, bungled police procedural yarns aren’t normally my sort of thing. But this is the true story of a Transylvanian desperado trying to get by as the iron curtain starts to lift in the late 1980’s and 1990’s. It is engaging, shocking and hilarious in equal measure”. Now and Z/Yen notices that this book is rare in physical form but still readily available on Kindle, which brings this summer reading special to a nice, circular conclusion.