The most fun book I've read in ages. Just like I think the dwarves in Tolkien are much more interesting than the elves and don't understand why the elves get all the attention, I've always thought werewolves are much more interesting than vampires and don't understand why vampires get all the attention.

So you can understand my elation about this book that elevates werewolves to the place they should have, and is written so beautifully that you find yourself stopping after reading just a few chapters at a time because you want time to just let it sink in instead of rushing on, even though you're desperate to know what happens next.

Just like science fiction can deal with some topics better than mainstream books can because of the larger canvas to paint on, this book gets a lot of mileage out of the protagonist being two hundred years old and having been around the block enough times to know how the world works. It doesn't hurt either that once a month he changes into a bloodthirsty animal and is ruled by forces beyond his control, thus making it impossible for him to pretend he lives in a world that's safe and controlled and predictable and sane and just and all those things, the way most people do.

The goal (financial independence) is laudable, but his way of achieving it is a bit off. Either he found a way to sell stuff on the internet or he didn't (there are plenty of skeptical people on the internet wondering if he's exaggerating his claims of success), but either way, he's hopelessly mistaken if he thinks that's a realistic goal for most people to aim at.

I also find the lifestyle he promotes dreary and more of a nightmare than a dream. He hasn't seemed to consider that while it might be fun for a short while it will not work in the long run.

Rarely does one come across a more hyped book. It begins well enough, and I'm curious to learn more about Sasha and Bennie, but no, the book turns out to consist of short stories about random other people who have no connection at all to each other. The stories are not believable and the quality of them goes downhill. The end the book is a farce with the slide presentation and the futuristic thing being ridiculously bad.

For such a famous book, I was expecting more. If you really compress it down, the book comes down to a single man sitting in a hotel room reading documents. The entire happenings have a strange detached quality to them, as if everyone is simply playing parts they don't really believe in and don't much care what happens anyway.