Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything , Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner.  Pop economics made accessible through anecdote - the only trouble is, I feel like I'd already read it. Levitt's papers have been reported so often that I've become familiar with their substance without having to read this book. It reads at times, more like basic sociology than economics, because there's very little hard data or facts involved. Occasionally, the book presents the result of an undocumented algorithm, but it does so in such a way as to insult the reader. The chapter on parenting looks like a lecture that hasn't even gotten an attempted revision. Levit repeats the same set of variables in three different places, perhaps assuming that the reader is too stupid to turn back a few pages if he forgets them. Highly readable, but also largely fluffy.