MALACHY MURRAYS UNIQUE NEW YORK From the Stories You Were Never Told Series

MODERN DAY DRUID GIVES TOURS OF NEW YORK CITY. Malachy is as unique as his New York is. 70+ short stories packed into 250 pages, about the greatest city of all time as told by one of the greatest storytellers of our time. Rated as New York City’s #1 tour guide; this one time boxer, sometime bounty hunter and now-and-again actor is now thankfully a writer. Captain Malachy takes us on one of his wild rides through New York City where time and tide await us. His tours are loaded with brief nuggets of historical gems, accentuated with his brash yet sharp wit and charm. Easy to read (Malachy is a self professed high school grad with a library card) and even more fun to follow. If you can’t make it to the Circle-Line Sightseeing cruises in New York City this summer to see Malachy live, this book is a close second to a great New York experience and THE ULTIMATE NEW YORK SOUVENIR.

User Ratings and Reviews

4 Stars Fun History
Visited NY the last of August for the first time. Malachy was the tour guide on the Circle Line boat tour my son and I took around Manhattan. For everyone who thinks history is boring, you will thoroughly enjoy how he gives you a recap of the how’s,when’s, where’s, and why’s of NY. This book models the tour talk he gives while you look around at all of the history and famous sights.

It’s light reading that leaves you with an education! He published this by himself so enjoy a handmade product full of his humor and unique twist on the Big Apple. Want to know where that phrase came from? This is where to look!

5 Stars Great storyteller and character!
If you ever get to NYC, take the Circle Line Tour and request his tour. He’s great! He’s funny, informative, serious, inspirational and takes great pride in his city.

5 Stars Excellent Perspective
I ordered Malachy Murray’s book after meeting him aboard the Circle Line Tour Boat on August 30th on the 4:30 pm tour. He is one of the most interesting people I have ever met. The book itself is truly unique in that it covers information and facts that a person would never know about unless they delved deeper into archives or lived the experience. Worth every penny and much, much more. My trip to NYC began on the Circle Line and will continue for months while reading and rereading “Unique New York”

John P. Hayden

4 Stars A New York Fairy Tale
The way Malachy Murry brings the reader closer to New York and the great history behind the big city is both exceptional and breathtaking. If you have the slightest interest to know anything about New York - this book comes highly recommanded.

In mid-August this year my wife and I had the pleasure of taking the full tour with Circle Line around Manhatten and our tour guide, Mr Murray, made that the most interesting, informative and enjoyable tours we’ve ever attended.

Thank you,

Janne & Trond, Norway

5 Stars Guidance from the Guide
We were lucky enough to get on a boat of the NY Circle Line where Malachy Murray held a microphone in his hand - and the attention of his audience as well. He made history come alive, and through his colourful comments on NYC the two hours on that boat went by without a boring minute.

This book is a fabulous way to remember this great tour of Manhattan, providing anecdotes and facts, and all of it in Malachy Murray’s unique style.

Well done, Malachy

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The Springboard How Storytelling Ignites Action in Knowledge Era Organizations KMCI Press

The Springboard: How Storytelling Ignites Action in Knowledge-Era Organizations is the first book to teach storytelling as a powerful and formal discipline for organizational change and knowledge management. The book explains how organizations can use certain types of stories (”springboard” stories) to communicate new or envisioned strategies, structures, identities, goals, and values to employees, partners and even customers.

Readers will learn techniques by which they can help their organizations become more unified, responsive, and intelligent. Storytelling is a management technique championed by gurus including Peter Senge, Tom Peters and Larry Prusak. Now Stephen Denning, an innovator in the new discipline of organizational storytelling, teaches how to use stories to address challenges fundamental to success in today’s information economy.

* Provides innovative and powerful tools which can effect organizational change
* Helps organizations share knowledge critical to success in the information economy
* First book on a major emerging trend in organizational change and K.M.

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars An Exceptional Guide to Organizational Transformation
I learned about this book after hearing author Steve Denning describe how he used story telling to inspire the World Bank to make knowledge management and sharing with clients a central part of its business model. Captivated by his powerful story, I wanted to learn more. I started by reading The Leader’s Guide to Storytelling, which every leader should read and apply. That’s a great book.

I noted at the back of the book that Mr. Denning offered to start conversations with his readers about storytelling. I quickly crafted a first attempt at a Springboard story and sent it to him by e-mail. I was delighted when Mr. Denning took the time to thoughtfully consider my story and raise questions to help me improve the story. From his questions, it was clear that I didn’t really understand yet what a Springboard story is.

One of his suggestions was that I consider writing a book like The Springboard, so naturally I had to read this book next. Before completing the book, I found myself with a much more thorough understanding of Springboard stories and how to use stories to launch and achieve organizational change. If I had read The Springboard before crafting the first draft of my Springboard story, I could have avoided many of the errors he so kindly and gently pointed out to me. While The Leader’s Guide to Storytelling has all of the elements about Springboard stories in it (along with many other types of essential stories that leaders need to tell), you need more context to appreciate what a Springboard story is. The Springboard gives you that context.

I highly recommend that you read The Springboard, and that you read it before you read The Leader’s Guide to Storytelling. You’ll make faster progress if you do.

The book has many valuable sides. You learn why stories work well both in terms of how listeners respond to them and the ways in which stories better capture reality than linear, abstract data. You also learn to craft a Springboard story and replace that story as your organization’s performance improves in the Springboard subject area. That was one of the important lessons I had missed. My subject for the Springboard story is encouraging people to create 2,000 percent solutions. Yet that activity has gone so far that I need to describe it differently than I did when I first began talking about the subject in the 1990s. I need to build on where it is today as a mainstream activity creating billions in value and improving millions of lives around the world, rather than as the hope for the future based on limited experience that I originally used to describe it.

For most leaders, this book will teach you more about effective leadership than most MBA programs will. Don’t miss it!

Here’s why. In most organizations, the leader finds it hard to get anyone to do anything differently. The best method is for people to decide that they like the change and want to spearhead it themselves as though they thought of it first. A Springboard story is one of the very few methods for creating that psychological reality. Otherwise, you have to follow the advice of all those management theorists who tell you to hide innovation and change on the periphery and simply repeat yourself constantly hoping someone will eventually get the idea.

If you have to choose between reading Leading Change and The Springboard, take The Springboard.

If you are involved in knowledge management, this book has a second benefit. It describes successful ways of dealing with the many challenges of defining, creating interest in and delivering a helpful knowledge management process into a large organization.

As you read this book, realize that Mr. Denning is describing a special kind of story telling that isn’t like what you are used to hearing around the campfire. Think of these stories as more like mini-cases in 50 words or less that point out an advantage that the hearer can quickly appreciate and seize. Once captured in the listener’s mind, the listener then fills in the details in a way that makes the idea the listener’s own. In this sense, storytelling isn’t far removed from the psychology of subliminal suggestions . . . except that there’s no subterfuge with these stories.

2 Stars ponderous
I found Denning’s book ponderous and self-indulgent. The central idea is fine, and the Appendices (17 pages total) have some excellent material. However, this would have been better presented as a 30-page handbook with the Appendices - not a rambling 196-page narrative that violates many of Denning’s own story-telling rules. Heath & Heath’s fine book, “Made to Stick”, gives this book inexplicably effusive praise. Perhaps H&H read only the Appendices…

4 Stars How to use storytelling to accomplish corporate communication goals
Stephen Denning is the senior executive responsible for knowledge management at the World Bank. As the author of several well-received books on the power of corporate storytelling, Denning is a recognized guru and pretty much dominates the storytelling franchise among business writers. He believes that simple stories, told face-to-face, possess a remarkable ability to convey information so that people readily understand it. Just as important, stories can be extremely inspirational if you tell them the right way. Use this powerful narrative technique to introduce new organizational strategies or change plans, to detail a corporate vision, to motivate employees, and to communicate with customers and other key external audiences. If you handle corporate communication, this book shows you how to put storytelling to work to boost your performance. We regard Denning as an innovative thinker and communicator, and recommends his thoughtful, valuable book. In fact, this book is worthwhile for anyone who wants to learn how to communicate more effectively, regardless of the purpose or circumstances.

2 Stars This is a really wierd book
This book started ok (for one chapter). Then it rambled on about the same anecdote chapter after chapter. It read like a monologue or something. This is not your book if you want to learn storytelling. In fact, I would recommend that the author find one for himself to read.

2 Stars Some value, but the writing style makes this a boring read
Storytelling is an effective way to communicate ideas and gain buy-in, but the story has to be compelling enough to capture and hold attention. This book fails to capture and hold your attention because the author’s writing style makes his story of discovering the positive impact of storytelling uninteresting.

There are some positives in the book. If you are involved in knowledge management, you may be able to follow the story a little better. Also, the appendix tells you the essential elements of a springboard story and takes stories in the book and dissects them into those elements. Finally, the book touches both on crafting the story and delivering the story, though neither is treated with a lot of depth.

If you already have experience with storytelling and want a reference on how to apply to business, this book could be useful. However, I would first look for a used copy to purchase.

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Super Babies Dora the Explorer 8×8

Once upon a time there lived twin babies — a boy and a girl. They were Super Babies! When Swiper swiped their Super Baby Banana Food, the babies — along with their sister, Dora — set off on a big adventure to get their food back!

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars FUN
ALL OF THESE BOOKS ARE FUN AND EDUCATIONAL. READING THIS TO MY DAUGHTER HELP HER WITH HER SPANISH AND ENGLISH.

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Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins How to Use Your Own Stories to Communicate with Power and Impact

Most people have been conditioned to believe that business communication must be clear, rational, and objective, with no place for emotion or subjective thinking. Yet the most powerful, persuasive communication has a human element…often delivered simply and personally through the telling of stories.

This book shows readers how to use personal stories to get their ideas across and create meaningful connections between themselves and their audience. Moving beyond the usual speech-openers or ice-breakers, the book gives readers a process for finding, developing, and using their own stories, including how to:

* gain people’s trust * use six different kinds of stories * shift from everyday thinking into story thinking * help shape group decisions and actions.

Filled with enlightening anecdotes, this practical guide gives readers the tools they need to persuade, inspire, and influence others through the power of story.

User Ratings and Reviews

3 Stars Nuts & Bolts of StoryTelling…
We’ve all sat through far too many painful business meetings and presentations with reams of Powerpoint slides exhibiting little emotion, connection and engagement by the presenter and the audience - and we’ve all watched the clock drag along wandering when we can get on with the rest of our lives. Annette Simmons explains why a story wins and captivates all audiences and why it is so remembered (a re-lived experience) when other forms of presentations simply vanish from our consciousness.

This is a good “nuts-and-bolts” how-to book on storytelling. The author uses an informal conversational tone that makes the book very readable. Yet I found the book to be listless - the stories and anecdotes to lack energy and punch - a significant “lead-by-example” opportunity left behind on the table.

1) Story Thinking - What does that even mean?

2) What is Story?

3) Training Your Brain

4) Telling Stories that Win

5) Who-I-am-Stories

6) Why-am-I-Here Stories

7) Teaching Stories

Vision Stories

9) Value-in-Action Stories

10) I-Know-What-You-Are-Thinking Stories

11) Experience is sensory

12) The Gift of Brevity

13) Brand, Organizational & Political Stories

14) Point of View

15) Story Listening

16) Call to Action

4 Stars Good Book
Interesting reading and thought-provoking. It has given me many things to consider that I will incorporate into my presentations.

1 Star empty
This is the worst book I’ve ever bought from amazon. I strongly encourage people to “search inside” before buying. Scan the first or second chapter for anything of value. You won’t find anything. The text (what little there is) focuses entirely on convincing you that you should tell more stories. It does this by making the same few trivial points over and over. Clearly, you don’t need to be convinced of this, since you already purchased the book. With regard to actually learning to tell effective stories (the purported purpose of the book) you will be disappointed.

As a point of further irritation, many of the pages in the book are blank. (supposedly so you can write your own stories inside) Do you really need to spend $14 for a hardcover notebook? (Hint: You don’t.) Furthermore, the last 7 pages of every chapter are exactly the same. (I’m not kidding.)

This book is content-free.

2 Stars Good for beginners
This book is probably most beneficial to leaders who have not typically thought or expressed themselves in “story.” It’s encouraging and offers solid ideas for those just starting to craft their own presentations.

But storytelling right-brainers — who may be attracted by the book’s title — likely will not find this book helpful. This book is very basic.

5 Stars great introduction to the craft of storytelling
I loved the book from the standpoint of helping people find their stories. My profession involves explaining complex technical processes to ordinary people. Learning how to explain takes a lot of practice. This book comes along at a good time. It is a simple but effective tool to help people sort out their own stories and present them in such a way as to be effective in pursuasive speech.

It’s on my must have list.

Jim Hoerricks

Author of Forensic Photoshop - a comprehensive imaging workflow for forensic professionals.

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The Elements of Persuasion Use Storytelling to Pitch Better Sell Faster and Win More Business

“Every great leader is a great storyteller,” says Harvard University psychologist Howard Gardner.

According to master storytellers Richard Maxwell and Robert Dickman, storytelling is a lot like running. Everyone knows how to do it, but few of us ever break the four-minute mile. What separates the great runners from the rest? The greats know not only how to hit every stride, but how every muscle fits together in that stride so that no effort is wasted and their goals are achieved. World-class runners know how to run from the inside out. World-class leaders know how to tell a story from the inside out.

In The Elements of Persuasion, Maxwell and Dickman teach you how to tell stories too. They show you how storytelling relates to every industry and how anyone can benefit from its power.

Maxwell and Dickman use their experiences—both in the entertainment industry and as corporate consultants—to deliver a formula for winning stories. All successful stories have five basic components: the passion with which the story is told, a hero who leads us through the story and allows us to see it through his or her eyes, an antagonist or obstacle that the hero must overcome, a moment of awareness that allows the hero to prevail, and the transformation in the hero and in the world that naturally results.

Let’s face it: leading is a lot more fun than following. Even if you never want to be a CEO or to change the world, you do want to have control over your own work and your own ideas. Ultimately, that is what the power of storytelling can give you.

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars Politics
Living in Washington, DC, I’ve been entertained for 35 years by our local brand of storytellers, aka “spin doctors.” The choice of heroes and antagonists seems almost arbitrary, depending on whose asses need covering or whose coffers need filling on any given day. In this political setting, the 5-element story model espoused by Maxwell and Dickman presents sharp new tools for evaluating stories and honing the power of my own.

5 Stars The Case for Storytelling as a Business-Critical Skill
Most of us would probably not identify storytelling as a business critical skill, and it is not likely to be found in the curriculum of business schools. But the authors are serious business consultants and have worked with some top-notch companies. Moreover, they don’t just talk about storytelling, they practice what they preach. The book is filled with engaging, powerful stories about the impact leaders can have when they understand the power of a compelling story. They recount examples of leaders who have done this successfully, as well as some who did not - to the detriment of their shareholders.

Although this is a quick, entertaining read, it merits careful study. This is not simply a book of stories, it is a practical how-to for those struggling for a way to capture the importance of their mission, their vision, the potential of a new technology, or any other idea crucial to success. When you have finished, you will consider you critical messages in a new way, looking for the Passion, Hero, Antagonist, Awareness and Transformation that will embed your story in the listener’s mind, and if successful, stir them to action. If you are a business leader, and especially if you are someone who sells products, ideas or concepts, this book belongs on your reading list.

Not all great business books are about strategy, execution, innovation, customer-focus or operational efficiency. This one is about a soft skill with hard impact. Highly recommended.

5 Stars Exceptionally well-written business storytelling insights revealed
In my quest for learning how to communicate better in business, I found this book and am thrilled with the consultative, practical insights shared by the authors. Very effective in using stories to communicate key points (as in Ritz and others) as well as specific strategies, this book reveals many practical business leadership skill “how to” tactics that any of us in executive or entrepreneurial roles will find useful.

One of the better-written, thoughtful and useful books I’ve read all year. Superb job on it - highly recommended.

-ken calhoun

4 Stars Gotta love the acronym - PHAAT!
Elements of Persuasion is well organized and engaging read supported by strong, relevant business examples and cutting edge scientific fact. It offers great insight into both the design and the mechanics of story; insights that are both cohesive and duplicatable. I know a number of the concepts from the book will become valuable assets to my own work in the corporate arena.

5 Stars An Absolute Must Read
A fool could quickly gloss through the Elements of Persuasion and not take much away from the book. But if you are at all curious about life, social interaction, and how the world really works, this book by Richard Maxwell and Robert Dickman takes it to a whole new level. As the authors wisely point out, “the human voice is by far the most powerful communication tool there is.” The book basically recognizes the universal themes of stories, and how they effect our lives. You could take the newest released books from the marketing sector, non-profit sector, sales, throw them away, and just read the Elements of Persuasion. And specifically, from my point of view as a screenwriter/director, this book is extremely more forward thinking than most of the other screenplay, writing, and story concept books that I’ve read.

Maxwell and Dickman tell fascinating stories throughout, and explain in great detail how these stories relate to real world situations in many different areas. From studies of children being able to form stories before they can talk, to why we all love the TV show House, even though the lead character is “obsessive, narcissistic, and abusive.” Quickly, you realize as you read that the most successful CEO’s, philanthropists, and movie stars all have one thing in common; great stories. And this book brilliantly guides you down the path to discover your own story.

The Elements lets you glimpse into a world where every interaction you have, business decision you make, family member you visit, is a complex and revealing story. It is both fascinating to think in those terms, and wonderful to know that there are real-world applications for all kinds of stories. And just on a personal level, I would honestly love some friends and co-workers of mine to read this book cover to cover so they wouldn’t bore me quite as much.

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