This episode is about one of my favorite books that I've ever read. And I've had this observation about books that I've ever read. And I've had this observation about books that I've really come to enjoy over the years, and maybe you've realized something similar.

There are several books. I'm not going to name them, but I can think of a half dozen books that I've recommended over the years and I tell people, oh, you got to read that book. It's so good. It changed my life, one of my favorite books. And I'm really

genuine about that recommendation. And then sometimes I go back and reread those books that I recommend and I realized that actually they were not that good.

They were pretty mediocre books.

But I think what happened is when I read them, maybe 10, 20 years ago even, they were like a

missing puzzle piece in my brain that they filled in. And so I remember them as

being life-changing because they were. Not necessarily because they were

profoundly insightful, but because they helped me figure out something that I was searching for at

the time. So this leads me to this idea that reading is

subjective. Different people are going to experience the magic of books in very

different ways, even the same book based off of where they are in life and what they're looking for in life.

But this book I want to talk about today has actually had the opposite impact on me.

I think I first read this book 15 or 20 years ago

and I've read it at least three, maybe four times,

and I actually think it gets better every time I reread it.

Rather than realizing that it was just a missing puzzle piece I just think it was a

truly profoundly insightful book when it was written. The book I want to talk about today is called The Big Change.

It was written by Frederick Lewis Allen who was an amateur historian. He wrote it in the 1950s.

And the premise of the book, it's very simple.

It's about how America changed culturally,

economically, politically, from 1900 to 1950.

And this was such an incredible period of time

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