Outliers: The Story of Success

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Penguin Books Limited, 2009 - Business & Economics - 309 pages

From the bestselling author of Blink and The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers: The Story of Success overturns conventional wisdom about genius to show us what makes an ordinary person an extreme overachiever.

Why do some people achieve so much more than others? Can they lie so far out of the ordinary?

In this provocative and inspiring book, Malcolm Gladwell looks at everyone from rock stars to professional athletes, software billionaires to scientific geniuses, to show that the story of success is far more surprising, and far more fascinating, than we could ever have imagined.

He reveals that it's as much about where we're from and what we do, as who we are - and that no one, not even a genius, ever makes it alone.

Outliers will change the way you think about your own life story, and about what makes us all unique.

'Gladwell is not only a brilliant storyteller; he can see what those stories tell us, the lessons they contain' Guardian

'Malcolm Gladwell is a global phenomenon ... he has a genius for making everything he writes seem like an impossible adventure' Observer

'He is the best kind of writer - the kind who makes you feel like you're a genius, rather than he's a genius' The Times

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About the author (2009)

In 2005, Time named Malcolm Gladwell one of its 100 most influential people. He is the author of three books, each of which reached number one on the New York Times Best Seller list. They are: The Tipping Point, Blink, and Outliers. His fourth book, What the Dog Saw and Other Adventures was published in 2009. He is a is a British-born Canadian journalist and author. Gladwell was a reporter for the Washington Post from 1987 to 1996, working first as a science writer and then as New York City bureau chief. Since 1996, he has been a staff writer for The New Yorker. He graduated with a degree in history from the University of Toronto's Trinity College in 1984.