ProfGolf

Larson is running out of ideas

Reviewed: 06-30-24

“The Devil in the White City” was a revelation because it told a riveting story against the backdrop of a compelling but obscure event. Larson’s books since then have tried to repeat the formula, with varying degrees of success. But this book fails entirely. Not only is the Civil War not an obscure event, it is probably the most over-covered chapter of American history by a wide margin. At this point, if you can’t write a “Team of Rivals”, that truly revises our perspective on that event, don’t bother. Worse, the story, if you can call it that, told against this overexposed backdrop is anything but compelling. The bulk of it focuses on the attack on Fort Sumter. Every school child knows how that came out, and no serious historian would argue that it was pivotal to the military or social consequences of the war. So I was left wondering why I bothered with this book, and doubting that I’ll read any more Larson books.

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Important history well told.

Reviewed: 02-22-24

Maddow rightly honors the individuals that stood against fascism in the middle of the last century. But she glosses over the other obvious conclusion of this story, which is that almost all the traitorous perpetrators got off Scott free. Some continued their political careers. Others were honored in their professions. The fascist catholic priest who promoted hatred and violence lived out his life in luxury on the money he conned out of his acolytes. Given this, what's to discourage the next generation of authoritarian democracy destroyers from giving it another try? If the rule of law is so weak that we can only rely on selfless acts of heroism to survive, then America is in a precarious position indeed.

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Unlistenable

Reviewed: 02-08-24

The ratio of condescending, egotistical, snarky remarks to actual insights is at least 1000 to 1. Indeed, I'm not sure there is an actual insight in this book. Other than coining the "black swan" name for surprising events, the author doesn't do much other than tell us how smart he is and how stupid everyone else is. And he takes a LONG time to do it. Every trivially obvious point is elaborated with hackneyed stories about turkeys and imaginary writers, which are littered with more insults and pompous preening. In the end, all I learned from this book is that the author is an insufferable a******! Worse than a waste of time!

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Beautifully written and narrated.

Reviewed: 07-04-23

Listening to Fry’s soothing voice is a pleasure in itself. That he relates stories we’ve either forgotten or never knew is an added bonus. A perfect audiobook in my opinion.

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1 person found this helpful

Excellent as always

Reviewed: 02-23-23

No one does audio courses better than Bob Greenberg. Every time I listen to one my ear for classical music is refreshed and rewarded. Thank you Professor Greenberg!

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Important story, boring book

Reviewed: 08-19-22

I valued learning about the human toll or US-Mexican border policies. But this book took a powerful story and buried it in a frustrating stream of diversions. Hearing about the use of urine to treat pink eye or a long list of products purchased by Mexican immigrants (an many other such trivialities) didn’t add to the story, but made the reading/listening experience very tedious. The editor should have cut this book down by half. As is, I really can’t recommend the book.

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Nowhere near a book’s worth of original content

Reviewed: 06-25-22

The main message of this book, that AI can and should enable more personal and empathic health care, could have been nicely presented in a position paper. But it’s been padded into a book with many quotes of the works of others, especially Harari, whose works are themselves syntheses of the original works of others. I’ve read these other works and didn’t need rehashes of them. So a disappointing audiobook for me.

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Entertaining stranger-in-a-strange-land story

Reviewed: 03-08-22

A charming story told with reserved British humor and read with just the right touch to match the tone of the book. I don’t get the critical reviews. Knocking this book as light weight research is like criticizing Newton’s Principia for having too few laughs. And the accusations of over-politicization smack of American defensiveness. If you want analytics or politics, look elsewhere. If you want humor and charm, this book has loads.

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A possibly interesting book undermined by narration.

Reviewed: 08-02-21

I’m not sure how much of this story is new information. It’s hard to tell when you fall asleep within 10 minutes. This narrator may be a saint of a person and a huge talent in other realms. But he should not be reading audio books. His monotone whisper, enlivened only by mispronunciations, would make even the most exciting epic a slog. For a fact heavy book like this one, it’s a kiss of death. I don’t normally complain about narrators, but this was a particularly egregious case of miscasting that needed to be called out, and has been by many other readers.

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Greenberg is the best!

Reviewed: 07-01-21

I’ve listened to many of his courses and they are all terrific. He’s knowledgeable, organized, insightful and very funny. And he plays wonderful music. I learn a lot and have a great time doing it.

Somehow I’ve overlooked the concerto of favor of symphonies, operas and chamber music. But no more. This course made me appreciate what a rich format the concerto represents. As always, thank you Professor Greenberg!

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