The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them ~Mark Twain

Take a moment to ask yourself: What was the last worthwhile novel I read? Unfortunately for all us Twi-hards, the popular vampire saga is not exactly the most educational summer read.

It is unrealistic to believe that simply receiving a college education will lead to success after graduation. In order to breed generations of thought-provoking, productive, multi-dimensional citizens, college students must consistently focus on the core of education: literacy skill.

While still in college, students with higher reading abilities will be more engaged in all subject areas. This will thus lead to more learning and greater potential for the future. Students must master the necessary skills needed to be effective in the workforce during their college career. Only through reading can a person acquire the critical skills further developed through writing and discussion. By picking up a book, you really can influence your own individual motivation and success.

"There was no real need . . . of crasting any more pretty polly to tolchock some old veck in an alley and viddy him swim in his blood¦ nor to do the ultra-violent on some shivering starry grey-haired ptitsa in a shop and go smecking off with the till's guts."

The use of nadsat in Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange, "a harsh, Russian accented slang“ initially parallels to that of gibberish to the common reader. On the contrary, it was this strange language that first intrigued my interest in the novel.

This particular book, with its unique title, stimulated my interest with its underlying political and moral dilemma. A young sociopath droog, Alex, is given the opportunity to be freed of his prison sentence if he chooses to submit to the repressive super-State's 'Ludovico Technique' “ an experimental aversive conditioning which will ultimately deprive him of his self-determination to choose a path of violence.

As one of The 100 Essential Books You Should Have Read in College by OnlineCourses.org, and as one of my personal favorite novels, I highly recommend finding a time to read A Clockwork Orange this summer. While you have time to spend on some books that aren't in your class syllabus, take time to look over the list and pick out some titles that will give you more to think about over summer break.

"books in a stack (a stack of books) courtesy austinevan via Flickr Creative Commons

It's summer, so if you are a college student textbooks are probably very far from your mind. But they shouldn't be. Next to tuition and room and board, textbooks represent the largest investment students make for college (yes, even more than "beverages").

Saturday's New York Times features an excellent profile on internet start-up Chegg. Chegg is an online resource where students can rent textbooks for a semester at a reduced rate, thus saving money on expensive books that either go into boxes or get sold back to the book store for ludicrously low rates at the end of the semester. As a resource, I would recommend you check out Chegg to see how you could benefit from the program.

But the Times piece goes further than describing Chegg's service. It turns out that Chegg is an excellent model for aspiring entrepreneurs. The site began in 2003 as a Craigslist for college campuses.

Yet the Craigslist model didn’t work. When classes ended in the spring, sellers couldn’t find many buyers online and sold their used books to the college store, often for pennies on the dollar. By the time students migrated back to campus in the fall, willing online sellers were few and far between.

So, in 2007, Mr. Rashid and Mr. Phumbhra went back to the drawing board and came up with the idea of renting books. At the time, Silicon Valley venture capitalists were focused on content, social networks and other businesses that could be supported by advertising, so finding investors wasn’t easy.

“People thought we were crazy,” Mr. Rashid said.

Now, as Chegg prepares for its third academic year in the textbook rental business, the business is growing rapidly. Jim Safka, a former chief executive of Match.com and Ask.com who was recently recruited to run Chegg, said the company’s revenue in 2008 was more than $10 million. This year, Chegg surpassed that in January alone, Mr. Safka said.

Chegg is a good example of recognizing your audience's wants and needs and adapting your business to successfully fulfill that niche. If you plan to start your own business after college, I recommend you read this article for an example of the persistence and adaptability necessary to run your own start up.

We have more entrepreneurial advice as well as other useful career info in today's Links ...

Adam McFarland at Brazen Careerist Offers: Advice on funding your first business. Adam has some experience with his own biz and gives some very strong advice about pacing yourself in this venture. This is a great post, and I highly recommend it for anyone just graduating and thinking about starting a business.

Ere.net Breaks Down: The advantages and disadvantages of the new trend of video interviews. This is an extraordinarily in-depth post (Part 2 of 2) on why we're seeing this trend, it's benefits and some potential limits of its ability. Dr John Sullivan, the posts author, seems to believe this is an inevitable shift, and I suppose I agree to some degree. I recommend you gives this a read to see how this trend may affect you, how it plays to your strengths and weaknesses as a candidate and how you can better prepare for a potential shift in the interview process.

Alison's Job Search Blog Gives: Advice on choosing a resume format that fits you. There are a variety of ways in which you can format a resume ... try to choose one that plays to your strengths. "Generic resumes don't work anymore. Instead, your resume needs to clearly show the employer why you should be selected for an interview."

Linda Rosendahl's HR Thoughts Asks: For easier federal job applications. "From the Federal Times, the dreaded knowledge, skills and abilities (KSA) questionnaires will be phased out. The Office of Personnel Management plans to ask agencies in September to stop requiring job seekers to fill out the time-consuming questionnaires." Apparently these tests were a major pain, and fairly inefficient. So ... Yay!