I used to teach a negotiation course for a foreign city government. If you are interested in learning negotiation but have not read this tiny book, please grab one for yourself. You are guaranteed to have fun to read it and to learn the best lessons on negotiation from a bargaining expert, Herb Cohen. This classic negotiation book vividly explains the most important negotiation principles though many amusing negotiation scenarios, ranging from buying refrigerators to bargaining with terrorists. After reading the book in 1994, I loved it so much that I decided to read more negotiation books and ended up writing and teaching negotiation myself. This is really a gem of the negotiation study.

I got interested in this book through an article from the Harvard Business Review. In the article Franco Bernabe, the CEO of an Italian conglomerate ENI, discusses the challenges to navigate his company through the power struggles and crises in the past decade. He recommends Memoirs of Hadrian as the best book about leadership. Bernabe said, "In this book, you come to see why Hadrian was one the the greatest Roman emperors. He did not have sophisticated training or leadership experience, but he did have a good understanding of human nature, and he was able to draw the best from everybody. This is leadership." After reading the book, I agree with Bernabe's comments and understand how the book greatly influenced Bernabe's leadership style described in the Harvard Business Review article. A masterpiece of literature and psychological novel, this book gave me a great pleasure by digesting it page by page.