Jack Covert Selects
“Jack Covert Selects” book reviews morphed out of a memo I produced each week in the late 1980s called the “New Acquisitions List.” Every Saturday I typed up the new book titles (yup, on a typewriter) from that week along with twenty-five to fifty words directly from the books’ flyleaf copy. I would then mail the list to my customers, mainly corporate librarians and the rare dedicated business-book reader. This piece filled an information void until Amazon arrived in 1995 and made reviews on specific genres, like business books, more readily available. My customers also changed during that time; corporate purchasing began to go the way of the woolly mammoth due to easy access to new information through the Internet.
For the new millennium, David Schwartz, my mentor and owner of the Harry W. Schwartz Bookshops, from which 800-CEO-READ originated, suggested that we grow the “New Acquisitions List” into a monthly review of recommended books—reviews that would consist of my words, not those of the publishers. The reviews would continue the conversation with our customers about good books while differentiating our suggested titles from the information available online. “Jack Covert Selects” was our first step toward branding our company as the arbiter of good business books. My reviews have become a cornerstone of the wide range of information products we offer to all avid business book readers.
Through the years, we have reviewed over 350 books. Twenty titles featured in this book were originally featured in “Jack Covert Selects.”
Written by Jack Covert
* Books reviewed in The 100 Best that appeared in “Jack Covert Selects”:
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
What Should I Do with My Life?