The Wizard of Menlo Park: How Thomas Alva Edison Invented the Modern World

My knowledge of Thomas Edison’s story and achievements was very limited before this book. I knew he had some relationship to “inventing electricity” and that our local electric utility ComEd is named after him. I also knew he had some sort of feud with Nikola Tesla (from an episode of Drunk History). This book didn’t mention Tesla at all, but it really clarified for me that Edison was a fairly big jerk. His inventor persona was largely overhyped, and he was a hapless businessman. (View on Amazon)