Outliers: The Story of Success

Malcolm Gladwell

Penguin UK, Nov 18, 2008 - Psychology - 320 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

What people are saying

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - Cecilturtle - LibraryThing

Gladwell invites the reader to look deep into "outliers' exceptions to a rule, to truly understand how they have come about. He looks at a series of cases, from the well-known to the obscure, to ...

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - Castlelass - LibraryThing

Gladwell is the “myth buster” of psychology and sociology. He takes commonly held assumptions and shows, based on his analysis, they are either not true or limited. In this book, he looks at phenomena ...

About the author

Malcolm Gladwell is the author of six international bestsellers: The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers, What the Dog Saw, David and Goliath and most recently, Talking to Strangers. He is the host of the podcast Revisionist History, a staff writer at The New Yorker, and co-founder of the audio company Pushkin Industries. He graduated from the University of Toronto, Trinity College, with a degree in history. Gladwell was born in England and grew up in rural Ontario. He lives in New York.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Outliers: The Story of Success
• Author: Malcolm Gladwell
• Publisher: Penguin UK, 2008
• ISBN: 014190349X, 9780141903491
• Length: 320 pages
• Subjects: Psychology / Applied Psychology; Psychology / Social Psychology; Self-Help / Personal Growth / General; Self-Help / Personal Growth / Success; Social Science / Sociology / General