What We’re Reading: Santa Cruz Works Launches a Recommended Books Section
Santa Cruz Works has launched a new Recommended Books section — a curated reading list for builders, founders, community leaders, students, and lifelong learners looking for ideas that stretch beyond the daily news cycle.
The collection brings together books on hospitality, meaning, entrepreneurship, history, grit, systems thinking, artificial intelligence, privacy, and spotting what comes next. The goal is simple: give our community a thoughtful place to find books that spark better conversations, sharper strategy, and deeper reflection.
The list opens with Steve Fortunato’s The Urgent Recovery of Hospitality, a timely reflection on generosity, service, and human connection. Fortunato makes the case that hospitality is not just an industry skill, but a civic practice — one that can restore trust, dignity, and care in everyday life.
From there, the list moves into life design, entrepreneurship, privacy, and the future of technology. Bill Burnett and Dave Evans’ How to Live a Meaningful Life brings the Stanford Life Design approach to questions of purpose and direction. Guy Kawasaki’s Everybody Has Something to Hide explores privacy, security, and well-being in an increasingly digital world. Tony Hughes’ Sentient invites readers into one of the biggest conversations of our time: what intelligence, agency, and consciousness may mean as AI becomes more capable.
The collection also includes books for founders and leaders trying to see around the next corner. The Startup of You by Reid Hoffman and Ben Casnocha reframes careers through an entrepreneurial lens. Rita McGrath’s Seeing Around Corners focuses on spotting inflection points before they become obvious. Dan Heath’s Upstream pushes readers to solve problems at the source instead of repeatedly fixing the same downstream failures. Pattern Breakers by Mike Maples Jr. and Peter Ziebelman explores how breakthrough startups identify the future before it feels inevitable.
There is also room for grit, history, and perspective. Angela Duckworth’s Grit examines why sustained effort often matters more than talent alone. Tom Standage’s A History of the World in 6 Glasses looks at civilization through beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and cola. Stephen E. Ambrose’s Nothing Like It in the World tells the story of the transcontinental railroad and the ambition, labor, politics, and engineering behind it. Benson Bobrick’s Angel in the Whirlwind revisits the American Revolution with a vivid eye for risk, leadership, and national transformation.
Together, these books reflect something central to the Santa Cruz Works community: innovation is not just about technology. It is about people, systems, history, resilience, timing, imagination, and the courage to build differently.
Explore the full list here: Recommended Books
Have a suggestion for a book we should read? Send your request to neil@santacruzworks.org