Show me the money
Money matters, as well as ordinary people achieving extraordinary things, make up this week’s selection of books.
Way Of The Wolf: Straight Line Selling: Master The Art Of Persuasion, Influence, And Success
Author: Jordan Belfort
Publisher: North Star Way, nonfiction
JORDAN Belfort’s rise and fall in the stockbroking world was immortalised in the hit 2013 movie The Wolf
Of Wall Street, which portrayed his huge successes in the 1990s before he was jailed for 22 months for fraud. After his release in 2006, Belfort began making a mark as a motivational speaker and author while offering training in his proprietary sales system online for a couple of thousand dollars.
In his latest book, Belfort offers a condensed version of the system that he used to create massive wealth for himself and his sales team. He emphasises that these are techniques that he and his team had tested successfully in real-life situations and that they can be used to become a master in everything from sales and negotiations to entrepreneurship and motivational speaking.
How I Wrote Ten Books
Author: Lydia Teh
Publisher: MPH Group Publishing, nonfiction
\LYDIA Teh wrote her first book at 39 while expecting her fourth child (she had to take a three-month break when the morning sickness got too bad) and has been regularly published since, breaking out with Honk! If You’re Malaysian, which has sold in excess of 30,000 copies since its release in 2007.
In this book, Teh – who has contributed to Star2 and who wrote a column on the English language in the Mind Our English series – shares how she managed to write 10 nonfiction books, six of those while managing the home and four children and the rest while operating an English-language centre.
21 Secrets Of Million-Dollar Sellers: America’s Top Earners Reveal The Keys To Sales Success
Author: Stephen J. Harvill
Publisher: Touchstone, business selfhelp
FORTUNE 50 consultant Stephen Harvill spent a year interviewing 175 sales superstars – these people earn at least US$1mil a year for their employers – from seven different industries to find out what set these top producers apart from their peers. What he found were 21 distinct behaviours that he shares in this book.
The book is organised around these 21 behaviours with Harvill using stories of real-life situations to further explain each of them, like the one about TC, who buys pizza for support staff in companies he’s selling to so he has the gatekeepers – receptionists, secretaries, personal assistants, etc – who could block access to the big boss on his side. He also draws on 30 years as a consultant who has worked with companies like Apple, Pepsi, and Samsung, to offer tips and takeaways to help readers improve in every aspect of any job.
Striving For Excellence: A Life Fulfilled
Author: Mohamed Iqbal Rawther
Publisher: Yayasan Pendidikan Islam, autobiography
MOHAMED Iqbal Rawther offers the story of an interesting life in this autobiography. He began his working life as an educationist, first a teacher and later a university lecturer, before becoming a trailblazer in the banking sector. He was at one time the secretary-general of the Malaysia-Japan Economic Association, playing an important role in building business-to-business bilateral ties between Malaysia and Japan.
He writes that while this book is for his grandchildren, he hopes that it will also serve as an inspiration to other young people to embark on a worthwhile life culminating in significant achievements.
How I Became A Broadcast Journalist
Author: Zaleha Khairene Ismail
Publisher: MPH Group Publishing, nonfiction
SHE was a final-year computer science student when she entered 9TV’s Pengacara Popular Channel 9 (Popular Host) contest – and was voted as the most popular contestant. From this unconventional start, Zaleha Khairene Ismail built a successful career in the competitive field of broadcast journalist.
Here she shares memories of early career fumbles, what it’s like to anchor major prime-time talk shows and host national-level celebrations as well as the behind-thescene realities of life in front of a camera.
Artemis
Author: Andy Weir
Publisher: Del Rey, science fiction
ANDY Weir, author of The Martian (2011), the book that became a surprise hit movie in 2015, returns to space, this time placing the action in a human colony on the moon.
Jasmine Bashar – Jazz for short – is practically a moon baby, having lived in Artemis, the lone moon colony since she was six years old. She’s a porter, making just enough money to rent the most basic living compartment – so, naturally, she supplements her income with a little bit of innocent smuggling. Then she’s offered the score of a lifetime: a payoff in the millions if she’s willing to help sabotage a mineral harvester owned by an aluminium factory. Hey, that doesn’t sound so bad, she thinks. Until, somehow, she finds herself in the centre of a plot to seize control of the moon.