Six books. Each one a different chamber of the same engine.
The Jingle Jared reading list. These are the books that bent the trajectory — the ones I hand to founders, writers, and anyone trying to build something that outlasts them.
- 01
The Odyssey
Homer (Robert Fagles translation)Read this several times. It hits different every time.
The entrepreneur's journey, written 3,000 years before there was a word for entrepreneur. You leave home. You fight monsters. You return. And the home you come back to doesn't look the same — because YOU don't look the same. Every battle reshapes you.
- 02
Finite and Infinite Games
James CarseLife is a game. The trick? Keep the ball in play. Don't try to win it all at once.
Finite players play to win. Infinite players play to keep playing. Every entrepreneur should know which game they're in.
- 03
The Black Swan
Nassim Nicholas TalebThe book that changed my life more than any other.
I quit my 9-to-5 less than 10 days after I finished it. Jingle Punks was born. Every entrepreneur needs to read this. The rare, the unpredictable, the impossible-until-it-happens — that's where the real upside lives.
- 04
The Age of Spiritual Machines
Ray KurzweilThis is why I work at the intersection of media and technology.
The Rosetta Stone for anybody living in a wired universe. Kurzweil saw the future and wrote the manual. If you want to understand where AI, media, and human consciousness are heading — start here.
- 05
Cable Cowboys
Mark RobichauxThe story of how John Malone and a handful of operators wired modern civilization.
Daniel Plainview energy. There Will Be Blood, but with coaxial. These men set out on an impossible mission and built the rails for everything we do now. Required reading if you want to understand media infrastructure — and the kind of grit it takes to bend an industry.
- 06
The 48 Laws of Power
Robert GreeneEssential reading for leaders and CEOs.
Same principles as Machiavelli's The Prince — just easier to read. Pair them if you have the appetite. Greene gives you the playbook. The Prince gives you the philosophy. Both are mirrors.