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3.68 AVERAGE
3.68 AVERAGE
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
I was disappointed in this book, since I saw the movie first. Probably the only case where the movie was better. My main complaint was the editing. The sentences were run-on and sometimes downright confusing. He needed a better editor.
Another book that I consider not as advertised... or maybe just not as Hollywood advertised it to be. The trailer for the movie shows a man and his son (who looks to be around 5) to be living on the streets barely making it and then the man starts gets some kind of break on Wall Street and their luck changes so to speak. Chris Gardener doesn't have his son until about 3/4 of the way thru the book and even then, that's not quite how the story goes. Not to mention the rest of the book is mostly about his douche canoe step dad and then about himself being a bit of a douche canoe. I give this a two star because he can write fairly well.
3.25 He was very honest about parts of his life that would be hard to admit for most people. However I would have liked more personal insight into some of these events. Also follow up on some of the people he mentioned. Not much was said about his mom after he moved out aside from a couple of chapters. These almost no remorse mentioned for the multiple times he cheated. Also did the guy he hit die? How did he feel about that? I found it too brief in some spots and way too detailed in others. (Clothing that other brokers wore) Compelling story for sure.
I should note that I’ve never seen the movie.
I should note that I’ve never seen the movie.
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
Honestly disappointed with this book. It took him 200 pages to get to his struggles on the street and that was like kinda the whole billing of the book. Also genuinely felt like he was motivated by two things the whole way: money and sex. He writes INCESSANTLY about his sex life and how that influenced nearly every decision he ever made. He claims he would never leave his son, but he moved to New York and left Little Chris in LA with his mother for multiple years to get his start on Wall Street. Maybe I’m being harsh but I felt like Chris was extremely unaware of himself.
Even better than the movie (which was also awesome in its own way.)
After seeing a trailer for this film in the cinema, my interest was piqued in Gardner's seemingly amazing story. Billed as the rise of a previously down-and-out homeless man to successful, multi-millionaire status, I was interested to read his story.
Unfortunately I don't feel the book (nor the film, judging by my OH's review of it on the flight home from our honeymoon) lived up to the hype one little bit.
The book starts off interestingly enough, with some background into Gardner's life with his mother and step-father, who is an abusive drunk. The whole family suffer from his step-father's outrages, not least of which his mother - who suffers at his hands more than once, and is sent to prison for retaliating. It is a story to tug on the heart strings.
The second part of the book then follows Chris' life away from the family unit, and his life through the navy and into stockbroking where he eventually made his fortune. His rise is certainly admirable, and he worked hard to achieve it.
During all of this, however, there is a backdrop surrounding his life with his wife, then subsequently with another lover - with whom he has his son, Chris Jr. After suffering at the hands of his step-father he vows never to be like that with his children, and is committed to being a stable father figure for them. However he ends up as a single-father and is homeless, living on the streets with his son and trying to earn enough money to get a house and daycare for him.
This is where the book starts to annoy me.
He seems committed to having children in a "stable" relationship, and makes a big deal out of this time and time again through the book. However, is a child with a father and absent mother really any better off than a child with a mother and absent father? It seems he is trying to take a moral high-ground where there is none. Once he gets higher up the echelons of success, he also then returns his children (as he has a second child during a visit from the son's mother) he seems willing to return the children to their mother (who they hardly know) on the other side of the country to further his career. Again, he seems to be taking this as some kind of moral high-ground when I struggle to see where that is exactly.
Alongside that, from the moment he leaves his family we hear no mention of them or how they are doing, and after introducing his mother, siblings, aunts and uncles to us so readily earlier on in the book, they disappear without a mention.
Finally, the best daycare centre in his area, and the one to which he aspires to getting a place for his son, is the one which cannot spell "happiness" and is the one which sparks the title of the book. that also irritated me as why would you want to place your child in a daycare facility like that!!!!!
It makes it a frustrating read, and not one which I would recommend to others."
Unfortunately I don't feel the book (nor the film, judging by my OH's review of it on the flight home from our honeymoon) lived up to the hype one little bit.
The book starts off interestingly enough, with some background into Gardner's life with his mother and step-father, who is an abusive drunk. The whole family suffer from his step-father's outrages, not least of which his mother - who suffers at his hands more than once, and is sent to prison for retaliating. It is a story to tug on the heart strings.
The second part of the book then follows Chris' life away from the family unit, and his life through the navy and into stockbroking where he eventually made his fortune. His rise is certainly admirable, and he worked hard to achieve it.
During all of this, however, there is a backdrop surrounding his life with his wife, then subsequently with another lover - with whom he has his son, Chris Jr. After suffering at the hands of his step-father he vows never to be like that with his children, and is committed to being a stable father figure for them. However he ends up as a single-father and is homeless, living on the streets with his son and trying to earn enough money to get a house and daycare for him.
This is where the book starts to annoy me.
He seems committed to having children in a "stable" relationship, and makes a big deal out of this time and time again through the book. However, is a child with a father and absent mother really any better off than a child with a mother and absent father? It seems he is trying to take a moral high-ground where there is none. Once he gets higher up the echelons of success, he also then returns his children (as he has a second child during a visit from the son's mother) he seems willing to return the children to their mother (who they hardly know) on the other side of the country to further his career. Again, he seems to be taking this as some kind of moral high-ground when I struggle to see where that is exactly.
Alongside that, from the moment he leaves his family we hear no mention of them or how they are doing, and after introducing his mother, siblings, aunts and uncles to us so readily earlier on in the book, they disappear without a mention.
Finally, the best daycare centre in his area, and the one to which he aspires to getting a place for his son, is the one which cannot spell "happiness" and is the one which sparks the title of the book. that also irritated me as why would you want to place your child in a daycare facility like that!!!!!
It makes it a frustrating read, and not one which I would recommend to others."
Great story about persevering when you feel like you can't anymore and you still keep going.
There is certainly a lot more to this story than you get in the movie of the same name. The story is amazing and inspiring but the book and the writing don't do the story justice.