Now that Do More Faster is out and I appreciate how hard it is to write and publish a book, I read every book through a different (more appreciative) lens.  This morning, I spent three hours on the coach and plowed through Behind the Cloud: The Untold Story of How Salesforce.com Went from Idea to Billion-Dollar Company-and Revolutionized an Industry.  It was excellent.

Marc Benioff, the founder and CEO of Salesforce.com, tells the story of Salesforce.com in 111 short stories.  He mixes each story with clear advice, from his perspective, about creating, building, and scaling a business.  I loved the format that Benioff used to organize these stories into clear themes, while still marching linearly through the story of Salesforce.com.

This is a book aimed at entrepreneurial CEO’s but scales nicely to any founder of a company.  It also reminds us of the actual evolution of Cloud Computing, which several very large technology companies continue to try to claim credit for.  When reading this book, you realize how deep and clear Benioff’s vision was from the beginning.

It was well worth the time to read and gave me some structural ideas for some writing that I’m working on.

With the release of our book “Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup“, my co-author David Cohen and I are taking the show on the road.  Next week is Palo Alto on Tuesday, Los Angeles on Thursday, and Seattle on Friday.

In most cities, we are doing four separate events:

Pitch More Faster:  Several emerging local companies will present their companies to me and several other local VCs. They will provide direct and specific advice to each company on how to improve their pitch and/or their business.  This is an invite only event.

TechStars For An Hour: If you’re interested in learning more about TechStars or possibly applying, this is a great chance to come and learn about the program from me and David Cohen (TechStars CEO). We’ll talk about the results so far, what it’s all about, how it works, and much more. The event is also great for angel investors and venture capitalists who would like to learn more about how the TechStars program works, and how to get involved. These are open but limited attendance events – you need to pre-register on Eventbrite (links below).

Angels In The Architecture: A group of local angel investors, me, and a few angel backed entrepreneurs will discuss the role of angels investors in the VC / angel ecosystem. This is an invite only event.

Evening Entrepreneurial Meetup: We will have a party at night – venues will vary by city. These will be open events – sign up on Plancast (links below).

The tour is being sponsored by Cooley, Silicon Valley Bank, Microsoft, and Rackspace.  We’ll be holding most of the day time events at one of their offices and we deeply appreciate all of their support.  We’ll have plenty of good stuff to give away along with interesting people to meet and spend time with, including many of the people that contributed to Do More Faster.

If you are interested in attending, get sign up info via the Do More Faster Plancast, the Do More Faster Facebook page, or the Do More Faster Twitter account.

In the mean time, the sign up links for next week’s events follow.  Since space is limited, please don’t sign up unless you are planning to attend.

Palo Alto: Tuesday October 12

3:30pm – 4:30pm: TechStars For An Hour

7:00pm – 9:00pm: Do More Faster Book Tour Kick Off: Gordon Biersch Brewery

Los Angeles: Thursday October 14

3:30pm – 4:30pm: TechStars For An Hour

7:30pm – 9:00pm: Do More Faster Evening Meetup (also knows as Two Guys and a Book and Beers): The Den of Hollywood

Seattle: Friday October 15

3:30pm – 4:30pm: TechStars For An Hour

7:00pm – 9:00pm: Do More Faster Evening Meetup (aka The Easy): TechStars Seattle

Of course, if you bring a copy of the book, David and I will happily sign it.

About a year ago David Cohen and I were having a beer together talking about ways to capture all the different things we’d learned about early stage entrepreneurship from running the TechStars program.  In a moment of insanity, we decided to write a book. The result is Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup.

Over the next six months, we worked with many of the mentors and entrepreneurs that have participated in TechStars.  Our goal was to write a unique book full of useful information for any early stage entrepreneur.  Rather than give advice or simply tell an entrepreneurial success story, we decided to blend the experience of the TechStars entrepreneurs and the TechStars mentors in an organized fashion.  As a result, we ended up with seven themes (Idea and Vision, People, Working Effectively, Product, Fundraising, Legal and Structure, and Work / Life Balance) and about eighty separate lessons and stories.

We were on the verge of self-publishing it when we were introduced to a senior editor at Wiley who embraced the project and one other one that we proposed.  As a result, we ended up with a two book deal with Wiley.  When I reflect on things, getting Wiley in the mix has been awesome as they have helped us materially improve the quality of the book.

My professional career – since I was 19 – has been focused on entrepreneurship either as an entrepreneur, angel investor, or venture capitalist.  I’ve spent a lot of time since 2005 thinking about the “science of entrepreneurship” as well as the “dynamics of entrepreneurial communities”, especially as I’ve helped bring Boulder to the forefront of entrepreneurial communities in the US.  I’m extremely excited about Do More Faster and hope it lives up to my expectations.  But most of all, I’m really grateful to everyone who has participated in TechStars and has contributed to the book.

The publication date is 10/4/10 and it should be in bookstores around the US by 10/20/10.  David and I are doing a 12 city book tour starting in Palo Alto on 10/12/10 – all the info is up on the Do More Faster Plancast.  And of course, you can follow Do More Faster on Twitter or join the Do More Faster Facebook Page.

Finally, Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup is available for pre-order on Amazon as of right now.  If you are interested, go grab a copy.

On page 89, the book’s unnamed protagonist said “My brain hurts.”  I thought to myself, so does mine.

God’s Debris is Scott Adams’ first non-fiction book (yes, that Scott Adams, the father of Dilbert.)  Well – it might be fiction, it might be philosophy, or it might be a novella.  Or maybe it’s something else.  But it’s fascinating.  And challenging.  But short.  It was tonight’s book (although the night is still relatively young so I’ll get started on the next one in a few minutes.)

This is not a religious book, nor is it a slam (or endorsement) of religion.  It is, in Adams’ words, a thought experiment.  One of the two characters is an old man who turns out to know everything.  He explains, through a series of short chapters on different subjects, all of the great mysteries of life.  While it’s easy to argue with some of his assertions, the old man (who turns out to be called The Avatar) explains things in a simple way that – while not bulletproof – is compelling.  Some of the chapter titles give you a quick feel for what is going to be covered: Free Will, Science, Where is Free Will Located?, Genuine Belief, Delusion Generator, Reincarnation, UFOs, and God, Free Will of a Penny, Evolution, Skeptics’ Disease, ESP and Luck, Light, Willpower, Holy Lands, and Relationships.

When I finished it, I hopped on Wikipedia and discovered that Scott Adams wrote a sequel called The Religion War.  I really want to read it on my Kindle but it’s only available in physical form so the atoms are now in the mail to me.

One of my favorite things about the month I spent each year in Homer is reading.  We don’t have a TV here and, other than going out to dinner for some extra fresh halibut, Amy and I end up spending almost every evening at home reading, writing, or knitting (well – she knits).  I usually consume about a book a day (a few take me two days – so it ends up being five a week, or about twenty over the month.)

Today’s book was Grumby by Andy Kessler.  And it was just fucking awesome.  On July 1st Andy sent me an email with the following description of the book.

“its a very funny novel set in Silicon Valley (and Wall Street), about a hacker that creates the next great consumer electronics device (believe me, you’ll want one) and then the rollercoaster ride of getting screwed by VCs, hacked, the deluge of orders, Chinese manufacturing, privacy issues and going public amongst the chaos of competition and rivalries. the technology is its own character, eyes, ears, voice and face recognition, GPS, spy software and a wise-ass personality.”

I don’t know Andy very well, although we met last year at Defrag (he was the opening speaker) and our paths have crossed a few times. I’ve read all his books and am a huge fan so rather than wait for him to send me a pre-publication copy, I just went online and spent $7.96 on the Kindle version which is available now.

Andy pretty much nails every aspect of the rise and fall of a garage startup in Silicon Valley.  His fiction is great – it’s fast paced (thanks to many short chapters), full of dialogue and great characters, and lots of startup / entrepreneurship / Silicon Valley cliches.  He spares no one and there were many times where I cringed in remembrance of something that hit a little too close to home.  Way to go Andy – you nailed it.