How to Build Impossible Things : Lessons in Life and Carpentry Mark Ellison by Mark EllisonMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
How to Build Impossible Things is an interesting book, in some ways it feels very much like a stream of consciousness ramble by an experienced man who's done lots of amazing things. It is part-memoir, part-notes of life, philosophy in the loosest sense of the word. Where it lacks depth, it tries to make up for it with the wittiness and personality on the pages.
Reading it felt like what I imagine New York feels like. It was irreverent, bold, a bit too much bluster at first but then the style grows on you as you come to respect the ease with which it doesn't take itself seriously. The stories are brash but funny, and they are the best part. For someone who hasn't had to renovate houses for the super rich, it is a window into a fantastical world where the author finds space for challenge, originality, and great folly. The last of these sometimes made me laugh out loud.
On the other hand, there is a loose sense of philosophy about the whole thing that doesn't quite work. The lessons are often basic but also, in an almost comic way, just not very aligned with the stories themselves. I think part of this is that the book is not chronological, but it is still kinda funny when the author tells us he is unafraid to tell people when he doesn't know something, and then a chapter later he tells us of how he got a job by lying to someone about whether he knew how to use specific bits of equipment.
At its core, How to Build Impossible Things is not a book that I could take very seriously. I don't think it wanted to be that book. Instead, it was funny, interesting, and sometimes wise purely through the brute strength of experience.
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