His innovative management style, success, and innate sense of fair play inspire intense loyalty.

Relating to the Internet as if it’s an extension of his own mind, he discovers that he has a talent for conceiving innovative enterprises and building teams that can develop them, becoming “a Pied Piper” of geeks. As a young man, despite suffering from what would eventually be diagnosed as bipolar disorder, he begins his pilgrim’s journey through the ups and downs in the brave new world of computers. Growing up in working-class Boston, English discovers a medium for his talents the first time he sees a computer. Tracy Kidder, the “master of the nonfiction narrative” ( The Baltimore Sun) and author of the bestselling classic The Soul of a New Machine, now tells the story of Paul English, a kinetic and unconventional inventor and entrepreneur, who as a boy rebelled against authority. His other non-fiction works include the Pulitzer Prize-winning 1981 book The Soul of a New Machine, about the creation of the minicomputer at Data General Corp. Kidder’s wheelhouse is creative genius with practical outcomes - and that’s who English is.“A perfectly executed, exquisitely reported parable of the Internet age and the wild, mad adventure that is start-up culture.”-Charles Duhiggįortune, mania, genius, philanthropy-the bestselling author of Mountains Beyond Mountains gives us the inspiring story of Paul English, the founder of Kayak and Lola. A National Book Award winner, Kidder is the author of 2003's Mountains Beyond Mountains, the biography of physician Paul Farmer and his work abroad fighting tuberculosis. One of today’s most acclaimed non-fiction writers, Tracy Kidder usually explores mesmerizing, if not widely known, personalities. While he is no household name like Gates or Zuckerberg, English’s life is inherently the fascinating story of the Internet boom and the beginnings of the online start-up culture.

Who wouldn’t sign up for that recovery program?Ĭo-founder of the travel website Kayak, English has made multiple-millions of dollars in the world of entrepreneurial geekdom, where deep-pocket venture capitalists turn to unconventional visionaries like him to gamble on the Next Big Thing - such as Facebook, Snapchat or Uber. The subtitle of A Truck Full of Money, Tracy Kidder's biographic tale of the inspirational life of maverick software pioneer and entrepreneur Paul English, is perplexing: One Man’s Quest to Recover from Great Success.

A truck full of money by tracy kidder