Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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78 of 87 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Morally bankrupt, 9 Dec 2008
Life, points out Macbeth, is a tale told by an idiot. The same, of course, is true of books written by Oliver James. Britain's most self-publicising pretend psychologist (does the British Psychological Society recognise his 'expertise'? Does it heck!) has been writing drivel for years, garbage purporting to be scientific but mainly the product of his distinctly peculiar mind.
The difference between this and some of his other books is that the central idea (money can't buy you happiness) is actually quite an accurate one which has been well researched by real psychologists. Granted, it's not original and even his title is stolen from another book, but he has the germ of an idea here - even if it's someone else's.
However, he is so hopeless with his arguments that he leaves you less convinced of even the most self-evident aspects than you were before you started reading. So Nigerians spend less time on the couch than New Yorkers? No kidding! They're probably busy wondering where their next meal is coming from. The World Health Organisation, which provides some of the data he mangles so incompetently, stress that the data should not be used to make like-for-like comparisons of states of mental health across countries. That doesn't stop Mr James, though.
A lousy book by a terrible author. Perhaps he should give some of his money away? He might feel better.
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76 of 85 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Ladies, stay home, 12 Feb 2008
This book is about the alleged evils of a virus called "affluenza" and how it can be cured. According to the author, the English speaking world is swept by this terrible virus. The most infected are also the most affluent. It is a relief to think that the richer you are the more likely you will be to catch this horrible virus. I am in no danger whatsoever and from the first lines, I am starting to think that I might have made a mistake buying this book. The impression is confirmed by reading on the first chapter, where we are told the tale of an incredibly obnoxious multi-billionaire, who is always dissatisfied with his life and that of a poor taxi driver, illegal alien, married with kids, who would not swap place wit the billionaire, because his life is so happy.
It sounds incredibly corny and it is. The rest of book is divided in chapters which follow the same structure: interviews with obnoxious people, all rich, young an beautiful but fatally infected by "affluenza" and then the odd one out, the guy (or gal) who should also been infected but isn't. You may wonder why, and the answer is because of mummy. It turns out that the epidemic of "affluenza" is mainly caused by the fact that women nowadays receive an education and want to work. Once they start working, they become so selfish as to want to spend all their money to buy useless things, like cosmetics, handbags and larger breasts, rather than aiming at getting married and having children. If they would just stay home and take care of their kids, there would be no problem at all.
Here the author goes out of his way to prove that children with working mothers are nothing short of sociopaths. Of course we cannot but agree, just thinking about the good old days when women used to stay at home all the time. War was something totally unheard of and the whole world population was so much happier: think about the Middle Ages, the witches burnt at stakes, the genocide of entire civilizations....
To make matters worse, the author also likes to point out how privileged and upper-class his life is. Unfortunately, I do not care in the least if he is used to drinking tea with the queen and going skiing with the king of Siam. I was expecting a serious piece of work about real situations and I found a book about a world that is as foreign to me as Mars, populated by super-achievers perennially depressed, despite the huge amounts of money they make. To conclude, if you want some answers about the problems of life, read some philosophical essays, if you have too much money and are very unhappy get yourself to a shrink, but do not waste your precious money to buy this book. My copy ended straight into the trash and it was the best moment, since the day I started reading it.
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220 of 248 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
no surprises, 12 Feb 2007
With predictable broadsheet lead-in articles and supporting quotes from the usual suspects (Self, Vine), Affluenza comes well trailed and fails to deliver much beyond expectations. It starts well - James is at his best when interviewing those he consider's effected with his virus - but the following "self-help" and "manifesto" sections are hackneyed and ineffectual. Chapters with titles like "Educate your children (Don't Brainwash Them)" are full of the banalities you would expect and the kind of meaningless semantic hairspliting of "Have Positive Volition (Not 'Think Positive') is indicative of his failure to outline any coherant "way to live".
You get the feeling that he does not really want to criticize the alienating effects of consumer culture too severely - he frequently bangs on about his private property, ingratiates himself with political and media figures and ends up leaving the reader with a forever qualified persepctive ("be successful..but not at the expense..."). At the risk of sounding like some out-moded counterculturalist - it is the total way of life, the entire perception prevalent in consumer societies, that needs to be challenged and you don't get the feeling that James is willing (or thinks it profitable...) to go this extra mile. For me - this renders all his suggestions towards a better life hollow.
To conclude - the case studies are interesting as far as they go but I feel Jame's has failed to consider the problems he detects in their fullest context. Colour supplement, book-to-talk-about stuff.
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