Book review: Walter Isaacson’s ‘The Code Breaker’ looks at how CRISPR may change the world
UC Berkeley Professor Jennifer Doudna won the Nobel Prize for her part in unlocking the secrets of CRISPR.
Mal Warwick
Freelancer Mal Warwick's reviews on his blog, occasionally appear on Berkeleyside. He is an author, entrepreneur, and impact investor who is one of three partners in One World Play Project, and founder and chairman of Mal Warwick Donordigital, an agency based in Berkeley and Washington, DC, that specializes in fundraising and marketing for nonprofits. Mal is the author, co-author, or editor of 20 books, most recently The Business Solution to Poverty and the best-selling fundraising text, How to Write Successful Fundraising Appeals.
Articles by Mal
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Book review: Annalee Newitz’s latest book ventures into urban history through the lens of archaeology
This book, ‘Four Lost Cities: A Secret History of the Urban Age,’ is, above all, a wide-angle portrait of archaeologists at work.
Review: ‘The Admirals’ discusses Chester Nimitz, head of the US Pacific fleet and long time Berkeleyan
The joint biography looks at Chester Nimitz, William Halsey, William Leahy and Ernest King.
Book review: From Aya de Leon, a brilliant thriller that exposes the FBI’s illegal tactics
Set in the East Bay, a young Black FBI lawyer is told to investigate a small group of eco-activist teens led by a charismatic Black man. Is the group really dangerous?
Alternate feminist history by Annalee Newitz, a gifted science fiction author
‘The Future of Another Timeline’ is the story of Tess, a middle-aged scientist who experiences 2022 as the present, and Beth, a teenage punk rocker living in the early 1990s.
Book review: A UC Berkeley scholar of right-wing politics dissects the Trump coalition
Donald Trump won the 2016 election by convincing America’s right-wing populists to migrate ideologically. Can he do it again?
Addicted to Nordic noir, Wendy Lesser set out to unravel its appeal
In ‘Scandinavian Noir,’ the Berkeley author explores what the genre tells us about the countries that spawned it.
Early 20th-century America viewed through the life of one extraordinary woman
Rose Pastor Stokes was a Russian-Jewish émigré socialist who married one of the richest men in the U.S. Together they promoted socialism – until their divorce in 1917.
Robert Reich explains how the ultra-wealthy have rigged the system
His new book, “The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It,” explains how systemic changes over the last 40 years have reallocated power upward to a tiny portion of the population — the 1%.
New book paints Leland Stanford as a notorious thief as well as a California governor
He founded Stanford University but he and his partners used the railroad monopoly they built as their private property, amassing huge fortunes.
Book review: Under deep cover in the CIA during the Cold War
‘Six Car Lengths Behind an Elephant’ is a memoir of living under deep cover for the CIA.
New thriller from S.A. Lelchuk introduces a badass private eye
The protagonist of the Berkeley author’s novel owns a book store on Telegraph Avenue, has a distaste for violent men, and bears more than a passing resemblance to “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo”s Lisbeth Salander.
Erik Tarloff’s novel revolves around a legendary actor and Hollywood mystery woman
‘Women in Black’ tells the story of Chance Hardwick, an exceptionally handsome young man from the Heartland who arrives in Hollywood in the 1950s. He becomes a movie star but, tragically, dies young.
A book critic selects his favorite books by Berkeley authors. And yes, three have the first name of Michael
The range of favorites includes the history of the FBI spying on Cal students, the danger from nuclear weapons, a biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt and more.
Michael Lewis’ ‘Fifth Risk’: A stinging indictment of Trump’s indifference to government
In reviewing this book for the NYT, Joe Klein notes that “‘The Fifth Risk’ raises the most important question of the moment: Have we grown too lazy and silly and poorly educated to sustain a working democracy?”
The Kellerman father-son team produces a new crime thriller
Jesse Kellerman, who lives in Berkeley, has written another novel with his father, Jonathan, about the former UC Berkeley basketball player turned deputy-coroner-cum-detective.
