Books

The third edition of Venture Deals is now available on Audible . It’s the unabridged version read by me and my partner/co-author Jason Mendelson with guest appearances by Matt Blumberg . We’ve been getting requests for an unabridged audio version of Venture Deals since we first came out with the book in 2012. We like to think that it has now aged like a good wine. If you are an audiobook person, you can know hear the dulcet tones of Jason’s voice alongside the scratchy whine (which has aged) of mine while learning how to be smarter than your VC and your lawyer.

I just finished the near-final draft of Cat Hoke’s upcoming book Second Chance. It is incredibly powerful on multiple levels. I’ve gotten to know Cat reasonably well over the past year. I first heard of her through the Techstars Foundation , where we gave her organization – Defy Ventures – one of our very first grants. I first met her a few months later in my office. After hearing her pitch for 15 minutes, I said “Cat – I’m all in – no need to sell me. What can I do to help?” ...

Recently, my friend Ross Baird came out with a new book, The Innovation Blind Spot . In the book, Ross outlines and diagnoses a problem that I’ve been exploring for over a decade: our innovation economy neglects many people and ideas. Ross kicks off the book with some pretty stark statistics: despite the fact that promising startup communities (such as my hometown of Boulder) are thriving, in most communities in America, firm creation is the lowest it’s been in a generation. With women making up less than 10% of new startups that are funded and African-Americans and Latinos making up less than 1%, it’s obvious we’re not seeing the best ideas in our innovation ecosystem. ...

In response to my post Book: Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape several people asked me for the feminist literature reading list that Amy had put together for me. Following are the other ten books that I’m working my way through this fall. Sexual Politics by Kate Millet Sisterhood is Forever by Robin Morgan The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde Ain’t I a Woman by bell hooks The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens by Alice Walker A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf Beyond God the Father by Mary Daly ...

“Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.” – Margaret Atwood A few weeks ago, after reading the New York Times Sunday Review article The Book That Made Us Feminists , I asked Amy for several recommendations for books that were foundational to the feminist movement. I purchased all that she suggested and added them to my infinite list of books to read. ...

The Audible version of Startup Opportunities: Know When to Quit Your Day Job, 2nd Edition is available for pre-order and will be on out on 9/19. My co-author, Sean Wise , read it using his deliciously dulcet voice. Jason and I also finished the Audible recording of Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist, 3rd Edition and expect to see it up on Audible in 60 days. More when it’s out. ...

I read Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant’s book Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy a few weeks ago. It’s a must read for every human on this planet. Some of you know that I’m a huge fan of Adam Grant. His book Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success is a key inspiration for the #GiveFirst moment, my own personal philosophy, and my upcoming book #GiveFirst: A New Philosophy for Business which should be out in 2018. ...

The Red Web: The Struggle Between Russia’s Digital Dictators and the New Online Revolutionaries was one of two books I read this weekend (the other was Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness ). It was outstanding. I made it the August book club book for my dad and my brother. And then, this morning, I woke up to the following headlines. Putin bans VPNs to stop Russians accessing prohibited websites Apple Removes Apps That Allowed China Users to Get Around Filters This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who is paying attention. There is now a long history of governments trying to control the Internet. One approach over government is censoring the Internet; another is weaponizing it. ...

My newest book, Startup Opportunities: Know When to Quit Your Day Job , is available via Kindle for $0.99 today. If you are a fan of my books, a friend, or just someone who is interested in startups, buy a copy today .

On May 23rd, I got an email from one of my favorite sci-fi writers (and close friend) Eliot Peper . It was titled “My very first scifi short story” and said: “David Cohen shared the idea that inspired this story. I drafted it last week. Thought you might enjoy and would love to hear what you think.” I was in the middle of grinding through my email backlog, so this stopped me in my tracks as I spent the next 15 minutes reading Eliot’s new short story. The first few sentences grabbed me. ...