Memoir spotlight
Source Code: My Beginnings
by Bill Gates
Before Microsoft: a memoir of an odd, obsessive Seattle childhood.
Buy the book
The first volume of Bill Gates's memoirs takes him from a difficult childhood in Seattle to the moment he dropped out of Harvard to found Microsoft with Paul Allen.
Publisher's blurb
Synopsis
Gates writes about the parts of his life he has previously skipped: a mother he clashed with constantly, a therapist who reframed his stubbornness, the death of his closest school friend, and the Lakeside computer room where a small group of teenagers taught themselves to program on borrowed machine time. The book ends in 1979, before the fortune.
The editorial feature
More candid than expected about temperament and privilege, if noticeably careful about anything after Microsoft's founding. The strongest passages are about friendship and grief rather than technology - which is likely not what the subtitle intends, but makes for a better book.
Book details
- Genre
- Memoir
- Released
- 4 February 2025
- Publisher
- Knopf
- Featured on
- 4 February 2025
Where to buy
Source Code: My Beginnings is available from these retailers.
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