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795 reviews for:
American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road
Nick Bilton
4.31 AVERAGE
795 reviews for:
American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road
Nick Bilton
4.31 AVERAGE
informative
slow-paced
adventurous
informative
fast-paced
dark
emotional
tense
slow-paced
Wow. This is an absolute page turner. The story details Ross Ulbricht’s creation of the Silk Road, with all the twists and turns along the way. The only reason I took a star off is the following: this is well-written narrative fiction but sometimes felt like the author was taking a bit too much liberty with the details. Some portions were particularly speculative, but I still really really enjoyed it.
adventurous
informative
tense
medium-paced
It was cool to learn about but like me and most non-fiction stories… I feel like I would have liked this story more as a movie or docuseries… it was cool though, felt like listening to a monotone podcast.
I had no idea what the Silk Road was going into this book. But it was a really fascinating and detailed story.
adventurous
informative
medium-paced
Captivating and fast paced. I would have given it five stars but:
1) It's presented as non-fiction but the author definitely used his imagination in some parts. For example how could he know what Ross was thinking in various parts of the story when he never interviewed him?
2) The murders Ross allegedly ordered were never proven, there were not even enough evidence to prosecute him but in the book it's being presented like it's certain he committed them
3) He shouldn't have fast forwarded the trial like that.
A big takeaway from this book is how unfair the justice system treated Ross, considering he will spend his entire life in prison while the 2 DEA agents who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars, sold information to criminals and tortured a person only got 5 years.
1) It's presented as non-fiction but the author definitely used his imagination in some parts. For example how could he know what Ross was thinking in various parts of the story when he never interviewed him?
2) The murders Ross allegedly ordered were never proven, there were not even enough evidence to prosecute him but in the book it's being presented like it's certain he committed them
3) He shouldn't have fast forwarded the trial like that.
A big takeaway from this book is how unfair the justice system treated Ross, considering he will spend his entire life in prison while the 2 DEA agents who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars, sold information to criminals and tortured a person only got 5 years.
2 stars
Interesting topic that I didn’t know much about so in that sense I learned something. However the writing was horrid. It was so dramatic and tried to end every chapter on a cliffhanger. It introduced a bunch of characters with mysterious and flowery descriptions when many were not super relevant and the tie in was weak. Spent too long in the setup and the actual climax was such a minor portion of the book. If paced and written better this would’ve been much better as the concept and research was pretty solid.
Interesting topic that I didn’t know much about so in that sense I learned something. However the writing was horrid. It was so dramatic and tried to end every chapter on a cliffhanger. It introduced a bunch of characters with mysterious and flowery descriptions when many were not super relevant and the tie in was weak. Spent too long in the setup and the actual climax was such a minor portion of the book. If paced and written better this would’ve been much better as the concept and research was pretty solid.
Gripping story and well-researched, but the writing could be better