Reviews and Comments

I don't know what I was expecting of this book, I seldom read that much into why a book is on my reading list. I get recommendations and if it looks interesting I will save it and probably read it months, if not even years later. This system works most of the time, it didn't this time around.

There are some interesting ideas in this book: The distribution of wealth (at least if we don't do anything about it, which the author says we won't), the distribution of work and the quality of it (same argument as above) and the way we will live (which has some very far fetched ideas).

The last point is one of the most stupid things about this book. He attests, that older people will end up living in the poorest neighborhoods, because it makes sense to live where it is cheapest if you don't need to go to work. Am I missing something or is this just plainly stupid? You still care if you live in a bad neighborhood, even if you are old, why would you suddenly not? People still care today and they try to work towards that their whole life.

He substantiates this by saying, people don't care about living well: Cities in Switzerland have been voted most livable, yet some random poorer city in Alabama or something is bigger than those cities in Switzerland, so it must be that people don't care about good living conditions or else it would be full there. I can't imagine that this is what he really thinks, because of how stupid this idea is.

He also imagines that there will be so much lower tier and higher tier work (which seems true) and the middle class will vanish, because middle class jobs are vanishing. This all seems very believable with the gig economy and all those skilled personnel that is needed nowadays. He thinks that nothing will change in favor of unskilled workers, because there are so many skilled and rich ones that will make it so through votes. I can't believe how sure he is, that those that need to have 2 to 3 jobs just to stay afloat will take the hit without any protest or voting for social policies.

Lastly, he also assures that this will turn out for the better, that this is good, even though it will suck for some people. People will also turn more conservative for some reason, even though statistics tells the opposite, because of people moving to bigger cities.

Those are just some of the weird ideas, that's why I can't be sure if he really knows what he is talking about, even though I'm even less of an expert. He could be right on any of those, but man, his arguments were so weak, I even laughed out loud on that argument about cities in Switzerland vs some bigger poorer cities in the US.

Wouldn't recommend this book and I would like to know who recommended this to me.

I'm not sure what to say about this book, the whole way it was written was a bit off for my taste. I feel like a grumpy old man saying this, but man, I'm too old for the over the top quirkiness.

I find it admirable that she wants to help people kick-start their creativity, the exercises are a good way to go here and she tries to make it approachable. I think it has some very good parts in it, especially those about projects being more about the process instead of only the goal. The structure was nice, I think she chose a good set of descriptions for the obstacles and how to circumvent them. There are also many good tips on how to make your creative endeavor easier.

It would have been nice if all that excellent information wasn't as hidden. She tries to write a self-help book, which is applaudable, but hides all that good juice of information in such a thicket of blah blah and trying too hard to be funny, which annoyed me. I want good concise information and a bit of humor, not random references and jokes with just a pinch of information. I can image that some would find it easier to digest, but to me it felt a bit long-winded. I don't like her kind of humor in this book, but I think that could be very subjective to me.

I think there are better books about creativity out there. If you think other books on this topic are too dry and boring, try this one though.

The whole story and world is such a vast and complex system. It often felt like some kind of bible story, which is very much on purpose, especially with those intro texts to every chapter. I did enjoy reading it, though it didn't pull me in as much as other books did. I'm not going to read the other books though, that's just too much for me.

It feels wrong, but that's kinda it. There's not much else to say there for me, I'm content with what I read and that's it. Nothing stuck in my mind, the protagonist felt a bit too predictable for my taste. I don't want to spoil anything, but it's just like those epic stories about this hero and his adventures.

I would recommend this one though, I think it had a nice pacing, twists, character development and rich personalities. I get why some would have the urge to read every single book and why this is one of the classics, but I'm just okay with this one and watching the movies.