I'm Feeling Lucky

A marketing director’s story of working at a startup called Google in the early days of the tech boom: “Vivid inside stories . . . Engrossing” (Ken Auletta).
 
Douglas Edwards wasn’t an engineer or a twentysomething fresh out of school when he received a job offer from a small but growing search engine company at the tail end of the 1990s. But founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin needed staff to develop the brand identity of their brainchild, and Edwards fit the bill with his journalistic background at the San Jose Mercury News, the newspaper of Silicon Valley.
 
It was a change of pace for Edwards, to say the least, and put him in a unique position to interact with and observe the staff as Google began its rocket ride to the top. In entertaining, self-deprecating style, he tells his story of participating in this moment of business and technology history, giving readers a chance to fully experience the bizarre mix of camaraderie and competition at this phenomenal company. Edwards, Google’s first director of marketing and brand management, describes the idiosyncratic Page and Brin, the evolution of the famously nonhierarchical structure in which every employee finds a problem to tackle and works independently, the races to develop and implement each new feature, and the many ideas that never came to pass. I’m Feeling Lucky reveals what it’s like to be “indeed lucky, sort of an accidental millionaire, a reluctant bystander in a sea of computer geniuses who changed the world. This is a rare look at what happened inside the building of the most important company of our time” (Seth Godin, author of Linchpin).
 
“An affectionate, compulsively readable recounting of the early years (1999–2005) of Google . . . This lively, thoughtful business memoir is more entertaining than it really has any right to be, and should be required reading for startup aficionados.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review
 
“Edwards recounts Google’s stumbles and rise with verve and humor and a generosity of spirit. He kept me turning the pages of this engrossing tale.” —Ken Auletta, author of Greed and Glory on Wall Street
 
“Funny, revealing, and instructive, with an insider’s perspective I hadn’t seen anywhere before. I thought I had followed the Google story closely, but I realized how much I’d missed after reading—and enjoying—this book.” —James Fallows, author of China Airborne

"[A] highly entertaining new memoir . . . I’m Feeling Lucky is at its best, and most hilarious, in its account of the company’s earliest days."—Bloomberg News"Edwards does an excellent job of telling his story with a fun, outsider-insider voice. The writing is sharp and takes full advantage of the fact that Edwards was in a unique position to gauge Google’s strengths and weaknesses, coming as he did from an "old-media’’ background . . . Part of what makes the book so rewarding is Edwards’s endlessly nuanced take on his former company and its employees"—Boston Globe"Affectionate, compulsively readable. . . . Thislively, thoughtful business memoir is more entertaining than it really has any right to be, and should be required reading for startup aficionados."
—Publishers Weekly"Although there have been many journalistic examinations of the world’s most valuable Internet brand, this is the first to capture the process and the feeling of what it was like to be there in the early days."—Booklist"[Edwards's] perspective as an early employee is valuable and unique . . . the former 'voice of Google' provides a detailed, quirky and expansive half-memoir/half-historical record."
-Kirkus Reviews
 "I’m Feeling Lucky is funny, revealing, and instructive, with an insider’s perspective I hadn’t seen anywhere before. I thought I had followed the Google story closely, but I realized how much I’d missed after reading—and enjoying—this book."
—James Fallows, author of Postcards from Tomorrow Square"Douglas Edwards is indeed lucky, sort of an accidental millionaire, a reluctant bystander in a sea of computer geniuses who changed the world. This is a rare look at what happened inside the building of the most important company of our time."
—Seth Godin, author of Linchpin "This is the first Google book told from the inside out. The teller is an ex-employee who joined Google early and who treats readers to vivid inside stories of what life was like before Google became a verb. Douglas Edwards recounts Google's stumble and rise with verve and humor and a generosity of spirit. He kept me turning the pages of this engrossing tale."
—Ken Auletta, author of Googled: The End of the World as We Know It

Doug Edwards was the director of consumer marketing and brand management at Google from 1999 to 2005 and was responsible for setting the tone and direction of the company’s communications with its users. Prior to joining Google, Edwards was the online brand group manager for the San Jose Mercury News, where he conceived and led development of the technology news site siliconvalley.com.