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A review by evanbernstein
The Empathy Problem by Gavin Extence
4.0
This is a generous 4 star rating. I liked reading the book. It was a fast read, but not a great book. I'm rating it 4 stars because I enjoyed my reading of it, but I'm not sure I'd recommend it to others. This is the 2nd book I've read by the author and if you haven't read anything by this author, read "The Universe Versus Alex Woods" instead. I plan to read more of his books.
The plot of this book is that a hedge fund manager gets a brain tumor is given months to live at the same time that the 99% movement is occupying part of london outside his office. He is egotistical and shallow and only focused on money at the beginning of the book. Clearly from the title and the setup, one would guess that by the end of the novel he would have learned empathy before dying and you'd hope it isn't as cheesy as that sounds like it is going to be. I think the author does as good a job as you can with that setup, but ... well, that really is what happens.
I liked that there is a therapist character who calls him on the awful things he is doing. I like that things are messy and aren't as clean as could be (which would have been easy more cheesy).
I agreed with the politics of it all, so I liked it, but it is close to being too cheesy a plot concept.
Spoiler
The plot of this book is that a hedge fund manager gets a brain tumor is given months to live at the same time that the 99% movement is occupying part of london outside his office. He is egotistical and shallow and only focused on money at the beginning of the book. Clearly from the title and the setup, one would guess that by the end of the novel he would have learned empathy before dying and you'd hope it isn't as cheesy as that sounds like it is going to be. I think the author does as good a job as you can with that setup, but ... well, that really is what happens.
I liked that there is a therapist character who calls him on the awful things he is doing. I like that things are messy and aren't as clean as could be (which would have been easy more cheesy).
I agreed with the politics of it all, so I liked it, but it is close to being too cheesy a plot concept.