Gio'

THis book is so fun. Very original even though the genre is not new. The characters are well developed and I was a little sad when the book ended.

I'm not particularly drawn to autobiographies, but this one was a nice surprise. It describes an era in which business was so different from now and it is good for once to hear of companies not built in Silicon Valley.

Getting through the book was definitely a slog. The style is exceedingly dry, mostly a collection of facts one after another with very little insight. There are a lot small filler facts that seem totally out of place. By the time I realized the book was a bore and not getting any better, I was already one third of the book in and decided to power through it, mostly because I was interested in the story.
One of the key points that weaken this book is that the author repeats again and again (and again and again) how great was the moral fortitude of the brothers, to the point of becoming annoying, and doing so, the author decided to absolutely brush over the darker parts of the personalities of the brothers with the goal of preserving a perfect memory of a great American Story. By throwing objectivity and completeness out of the window, I think he obtained this flat recount of facts filtered to only put the brothers in good light. Questionable...

Specific to the audiobook: the choice of the author to narrate the book himself is an unfortunate one. He is not a gifted actor and his execution is monotone at best.

This was definitely the book from Sedaris that made me laugh the most. I was thoroughly enjoying it and ready to give it 4 stars (I rated all of his other books 3 stars) but the last 10% of the book turned out to be pretty weak. Pretty much all the pieces in which he doesn't describe his life but invents a different persona are pretty bad. And so we stay at 3 stars. At least the weakest part of the book is all concentrated at the end...

The author seems to be obsessed with death and so a lot of the short stories in this book are about what supernatural things can happen before and after one dies. This makes the collection a little monotone but overall I didn't enjoy this book because none of these stories is particularly memorable.

The book is not particularly well written or well organized. I believe that working with a great ghostwriter would have delivered a much better book. Having said that, the story is so powerful that the book is worth reading and I believe it will stay with me for a while. Everybody know that things in North Korea are crazy, but a first person account like this is incredible.

The book is not particularly well written or well organized. I believe that working with a great ghostwriter would have delivered a much better book. Having said that, the story is so powerful that the book is worth reading and I believe it will stay with me for a while. Everybody know that things in North Korea are crazy, but a first person account like this is incredible.

This book has many different types of narration in it, but only few if them were interesting to me. The rest was, for me, a bunch of fillers that didn't resonate.

This book has many different types of narration in it, but only few if them were interesting to me. The rest was, for me, a bunch of fillers that didn't resonate.

How many talents does John Grisham have? He really is a book machine and this sport centered book is truly enjoyable and explores many things, the most obvious is college basketball, but also some of the situations in Africa and US immigration. I'm keeping the rating at 4 stars because the plot left me slightly unsatisfied.

How many talents does John Grisham have? He really is a book machine and this sport centered book is truly enjoyable and explores many things, the most obvious is college basketball, but also some of the situations in Africa and US immigration. I'm keeping the rating at 4 stars because the plot left me slightly unsatisfied.

I was a little worried about starting this book. I was mainly concerned about the prequel not being that interesting. Of course the author proved me wrong with unexpected additional layers adding to this story. There are some filler parts here and there and that's why I keep the rating at 4 stars, but overall I enjoyed this a lot and look forward to reading Dust.

This is a difficult book to rate. There are many positive and negatives. On the negative side, like in The man called Ove, the book is full of cliches and the characters all do dumb things, so the reader can see from a mile away where the things are going. This aspect makes the plot almost amateurish. On the positive side, I have to be honest with myself and admit that I could not put the book down and I wanted to know how it ended...

One of the few books that I had to stop reading halfway (I usually take the decision to stop reading much sooner, but this time I made a mistake of hoping that it would get better). The tone is excessively light to the point of being childish, the intertwined romance is silly and the story doesn't go anywhere. Very dull.

The book comes out of the gate roaring. Innovative, fun and interesting, but then... more of the same for the entire book to the point of quickly becoming repetitive and boring. It picks up again at the end but that wasn't enough to cancel the feeling that this is a short story excessively stretched to a full book.

I truly enjoyed this book. Written with very slick style and somehow the author is able to use complex and highbrow words and a particularly sophisticated italian without sounding obnoxious. The stories of these two lives are beautiful and intense. I listened to the italian audiobook and the narration was also very very good.

This is a minor Gladwell book. Not that interesting and not the usual entertaining style. It does deliver some good information but the it continuously overstates the importance of it all.

Very short read. Hard to call it a book. Most of the concepts expressed should be very well known, but they are nicely exposed and organized. While I wholly agree with the author with almost everything, I cannot say that there is enough originality to justify more than 3 stars.

While this book is considered a masterpiece by many, I found it just ok. Maybe I had to read too many of these stories growing up in the South of Italy to find any surprise in it.

This book is really good. It is fascinating how expansive the world created by the author is given the subject. Superbly written with fully developed character, it is a truly engaging story.

This book is really good. It is fascinating how expansive the world created by the author is given the subject. Superbly written with fully developed character, it is a truly engaging story.

What an incredible book. The stories are so incredible and there are so many that many some of them would deserve their own book. Entire different underworlds are described in such detail that is very difficult to remember that only some of the stories are entirely true. In many moments, while reading this book, I was taken by surprise by how much the book still have to give. Just when I thought it had given enough, it would go in a totally different and new direction. One of the most impressive book I read. It made me feel again like when I was reading Jules Verne books as a kid.