Beyond Order: 12 More Rules For Life

Listening to this as an audiobook was an ABZURD idea! ABZOLUTELY ABZURD!

For real though. I enjoyed 12 Rules a fair bit, but all of Peterson's more irritating qualities are fully on display in this one - hyperbolic language (primordial! chaos! Hell!), Long tangents/explanations in the middle of a chapter that make me genuinely forget what the “rule” is for this chapter, and tons of bible analysis that is completely unnecessary and totally boring. That said, I listened to this on audio, and read 12 Rules with my eyes, which means I didn't have Peterson's ABZURD style being delivered in his own ABZURD voice. I think I probably would have enjoyed it more if I read it, I may do that at some point in the future. But as audio, I was constantly drawn in by how dramatic he was making whatever example and then the actual point would sail on past me.

Mostly, this book just felt unnecessary. I have no doubt it will help some people, but it felt half baked. I'm unsure if it's because Peterson kept almost dying last year and just wanted to put it out, or if it's because the entire thing is a cash grab, or some sort of combination of both.

The most amusing aspect of the entire thing is how much controversy there was over the publishing of an extraordinarily benign book.