Daniel
Neil Gaiman knows how to spin a tale and he's skilled at storytelling. Unfortunately, the main plot is weak, and many of the plots don't really seem to lead anywhere. With a big book like this, it's a big undertaking and takes a lot of time to go through it, and at the end you hope to get more out of it.
This book was really stupid. I kept reading it because I could not not read a book which has a Commodore 64 in it and lots of other neat stuff. While that did make up for many things, it didn't nearly make up enough. The book had a very terrible plot line, the “bad guy” was far too obvious and uninspired. There was little character development to speak of, in fact, most characters were rather shallow. If you want to read it, count on reading almost all of the book before there's any revelation as to what the main plot is. Sadly. Some parts were funny, others silly, and some downright stupid. So much for trusting all the good reviews.
There are two reasons I didn't think this book deserved a five star which isn't surprising many people give it. My reasons are pretty basic too.
1. There's simply a lot of fluff. The added stories are relevant and add to his point, but there's still a lot of fluff around what he's trying to get across.
2. it really annoyed me when he talked about Lincoln as he cared about slaves. There were several other passages about famous people (or notorious as Lincoln is more aptly described) that I also didn't agree with. Lincoln was one of the most hated presidents ever during his time.
“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races - that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believed will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality.”
- Lincoln during his fourth debate with Stephan Douglas - Sept. 18, 1858
That said, the actual material itself and the lessons are worth five stars.
I'm not sure what to rate this book. It was a difficult read. Locke had serious issues with punctuation and sentences that covered half a page. It was basically not an easy read, and I also think he tended to ramble. In addition, there were several instances where he referred to God as more or less a final arbitrator. I don't think God needs to be used to justify the ideas. ANyway, I liked some of the ideas, but it really was a case of me forcing my way through the book.
I had to put down the english copy I started reading because it became apparent in the first few paragraphs that this book was poorly translated. Swedish colloquialism shone through and it was frustrating. In Swedish the book is well written with a lot of charm, I didn't get that sense from the English version. Quite the entertaining book and if you're not careful you may pick up quite a bit of history.
Although this book describes the last adventure of Allan, he sure had a lot of them in his time. I very much enjoyed the characters and their development.
This is an excellent read. The book is very well referenced and filled with the common legal interpretations of the time as well as discussions between all the parties involved. It gives you a framework for how to read and interpret the constitution the way it was meant to be. Think you can just read it the constitution with modern day language and understand it? I used to think so, but now that I understand the legal maxims used at the time and how legal constructs were formed, there's much more deeper meaning behind how they wrote the document. He also does a excellent job of showing how language has developed and through references to legal works and other document show the real meaning of the words the founders used, and what the intent behind them were.
The constitution was meant to be read and interpreted by the intent of the thousands of people who were involved. This book helps you understand what that intent was
I notice most people who give this book a high rating start off by saying that it is an influential piece of work; important, and so on. So what? That doesn't make the ideas in it any better. In fact, the ideas are terrible. He can babble about classes all he wants, but when he never defines what a social class is, it's utterly meaningless.
However, don't construe my rating as suggesting that you don't read it. You should read this work precisely because it was influential; because it has been important. Anything that can give you a further understanding of history and of mankind is worth spending time on.
“But even in Das Kapital Marx does not delimit precisely the concept of class, although it is of fundamental importance for his theory. He does not define what class is, but limits himself to enumerating the “great classes” into which modern capitalist society is divided.” – Ludwig Von Mises, Socialism.
