Write Out Loud (Reviews and Writing)

The summer has been a busy one for me, one way or another, with various projects on the go, including some collaborative enterprises. In the last couple of weeks these two such collaborations have come up.

Shortform

I’ve teamed up with a brilliant company called Shortform who are superb for anyone who likes reading but is busy (like yours truly here).

Shortform produce in-depth summaries of non-fiction books. These are intelligently written and really helpful guides that give you the key points deep enough to really understand them but short enough to be manageable. They give context to the book and often provide exercises or other material not in the book itself to help you get to know the content really well.

Of course, it is always best to read the book itself – and Shortform encourage this – but these notes allow you to find key points again afterwards, or allow you to quickly refresh your understanding if you haven’t read it in a while. OR you could just read the summary and never touch the book – it’s up to you! Either way, you won’t find a better, more user-friendly summary of non-fiction books.

It doesn’t end there though. If you’re a Chrome user, Shortform have an amazing app that will give you a summary of anything you’re reading. For me, this is worth double the price. I’ve used this app every single day with dozens of articles.

It even does summaries of YouTube videos and audio podcasts. I’ve checked it for accuracy and it is completely on point. The summary appears in seconds and gives not just the summary itself but a context sections, further reading links and counterarguments. I’m often going through in-depth science research podcasts or political discussions and even when played speeded up (which is always how I listen to anything) these podcasts often take up sizeable amounts of time I don’t have (30-90 minutes per podcast). The Shortform app gives me the same information but it takes minutes to read and that has really helped my workload. It’s my go-to app for research now.

The list of books on Shortform is growing all the time and subscribers get to vote on what books they want summarised next. The books are well categorised into topics like Communication, Motivation, Business etc., and there’s some great titles. I’ve enjoyed going over the classic How to Win Friends and Influence People, and reminded again of the key points from Atomic Habits – both of which I have reviewed here in the past, so do take a look. I’m about to sit down and work through the Bill Bryson collection of books too. I adore Bryson, so I’m really looking forward to this.

You can check it out for yourself by clicking on this link (or any of the Shortform links throughout this post). You get a free trial and 20% off if you sign up using this link. Honestly guys, it’s really good and the company is building its catalogue of books every day. If it is a major non-fiction book, there’s a good chance Shortform have covered it.

Okay, that plug over…

Forthcoming video book review podcast

I’ve also teamed up with an excellent writer, Nicholas Graham (whose brilliant novel, The Judas Case, is available here), to start putting out monthly book reviews on video together.

Nick is an old friend of mine and we’ve sunk many a glass (AKA a bottle) of wine over the years discussing the wide range of literature we enjoy (or don’t!). We felt it was about time we let you in on the conversations.

Each month, we’ll aim to present a book each and try to persuade each other why we should – or should not – read this book. Each video will be around 30 minutes long (assuming we don’t ramble…)

We’ve just recorded our first trial video and will upload it here soon. I’ll add a link here when it’s up.

This is such a brand new idea that we haven’t yet agreed on a title for this video podcast. Any ideas? Hit the comments section and let us have them!

Anyway, I hope you’ll find the reviews interesting. Nick is a truly lovely guy and immensely knowledgeable about literature. I’m sure you’ll enjoy his company as much as I do.

Social Entrepreneur, educationalist, bestselling author and journalist, D K Powell is the author of the bestselling collection of literary short stories “The Old Man on the Beach“. His first book, ‘Sonali’ is a photo-memoir journal of life in Bangladesh and has been highly praised by the Bangladeshi diaspora worldwide. Students learning the Bengali language have also valued the English/Bengali translations on every page. His third book is ‘Try not to Laugh’ and is a guide to memorising, revising and passing exams for students.

Both ‘The Old Man on the Beach’ and ‘Sonali’ are available on Amazon for kindle and paperback. Published by Shopno Sriti Media. The novel,’The Pukur’, was published by Histria Books in 2022.

D K Powell is available to speak at events (see his TEDx talk here) and can be contacted at dkpowell.contact@gmail.com. Alternatively, he is available for one-to-one mentoring and runs a course on the psychology of writing. Listen to his life story in interview with the BBC here.

Ken writes for a number of publications around the world. Past reviewer for Paste magazine, The Doughnut, E2D and United Airways and Lancashire Life magazine. Currently reviews for Northern Arts Review. His reviews have been read more than 7.9 million times.

Get a free trial and 20% off Shortform by clicking here. Shortform is a brilliant tool and comes with my highest recommendation.