The Man Who Risked It All

My wife enthusiastically recommended that I read this book about a man's inspirational hero's journey from suicidal despair to personal and corporate victory. Often fiction is a better medium than non-fiction for impactfully teaching philosophy and this book will go on my shortlist of must-read fiction for personal development pragmatists along with Memoir From Antproof Case and Atlas Shrugged. The book hints at what I believe which is that NLP and Cognitive behavioral therapy are effective tools for transformation, for living a better life and that Psychoanalysis is the pseudoscientific, time-wasting fraud. It's a fun, easy read that makes me want to visit Paris with some red pill truths about life, women, and the business world. It has a great twist at the end, I enthusiastically recommend The Man Who Risked It All to anyone passionate about taking action in their personal development.

The book was very insightful and inspirational :)

The characters are pulled from the modern daily struggles we all can identify with. The questions are relevant and true. Engaging and compelling story.

Not only was this book well written with a very interesting story line, but it also had some great ideas about changing behaviors & living life well yet fearlessly. Of course, having the story take place in Paris is always wonderful for me.

Really well written, thoughtful book with unexpected ending,

Not a big book so it doesn't take long. Its a thinly disguised self help book. There's a thin story on top, a mystery of sorts to keep you guessing. The story is pretty simple. Then there are long sections where one character is teaching another for several pages, explaining things. This is the self help at the heart of the book. The purpose of the book. Its all pretty basic.

This is an interesting book that I don't think quite works as a novel. It feels like a slightly over written moral tale, where the moral is pointed out just a bit too obviously. That said it is an interesting story, that picks up pace towards the end. It does touch on many interesting issues and themes, and does so using a story to hang the teaching points on. The sections in chapter 17 on how to enter into another's world, and understand things from the other's point of view are particularly well done. The story begins as a dramatisation of Camus's question: "Suicide:- why not?" The young lead character Alan Greenmor is considering suicide, and just as he gets to the point of acting on his justifications he gets challenged by Yves Dubreuil, who has a particular interest in Alan- for reasons you find out at the end of the book. There follows a series of teaching tasks which are interesting but not gripping. They feel like an NLP course in story format. The early part of Alan's journey is a little slow, and you need to push on to find out how the story will build. The action does get more interesting, and there's some significant interest and challenge in seeing how Alan manages his tyrannical boss at work, and some good observations of commercial imperatives, and how people respond in response to them. This book is all about managing people and relationships- and setting Alan's work in a personnel agency makes perfect sense here- we see how Alan treats himself- and how his company treats others. Yves Dubreuil leads Alan through a series of realisations and helps Alan deal with a scenario which is threatening to him personally and to the overall company. A lot of readers who work in office and consultancy scenarios- and to targets- will recognise such concerns and may learn something from Alan's travails. The pace picks up towards to the end with an absurd but entertaining journey back from Provence to Paris on one Euro. By this stage Alan Greenmoor is reinvigorated and purposeful, and wants to do things and the book describes well how he gets on with them. Yves Dubreuil is getting by turns more worried and more proud of his protege. The books ends well. The book is an interesting journey, and has some recognisable and enjoyable characters, as well as some absurdity, and some humour in it. There are some useful ideas about persuasion which it's worth quoting here:- "You can't change people you know. You can just show them a path and then make them want to take it." "When you reject someone or simply his ideas you force him to dig in his heels and stand his ground. Why should he take an interest in what you have to say if you reject his point of view?" "It's the law of dynamics. Isaac Newton proved that when you exercise a force of certain strength on an object, it produces back an opposite force of equal strength. Well, it's the same for human relations. When you use energy to try and convince someone, it's as though you were directing a force at him that applies pressure. He feels the pressure, and this makes him push in the opposite direction. Push him, he'll push you back." "Pushing is starting from your position and wanting to impose it on the other. Pulling is starting from the other's position and gradually bringing him to you...Pulling involves going into the other's universe as well, but this time to allow him to change. The point of departure is still the same: Go and find the other where he is." These are all old messages, but we keep on getting them wrong or ignoring them, or not acting on them. I think we all benefit to be reminded of them every so often. This book is really about understanding ourselves and others. Debreuil summarises this with a quote from Proust, "The only real journey, the only Fountain of Youth, would be to travel not toward new landscapes but with new eyes, to see the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to see the hundred universes that each of them can see, or can be." This book is a reasonable story and it asks us questions about how we see, and so relate, to ourselves and others. Readers will all get something out of it and it's an enjoyable read, especially towards to end where the action quickens, and the teaching reduces. It's a book that will attract some people, and if you are one of them I suspect you will enjoy it.

Bought it as a gift after reading his earlier work, it was well received.

Although this story seems unlikely, it actually holds your attention so that you keep coming back to it quite happily to find out what's going to happen next. There is also some philosophy of life woven into the story which makes it more compelling. There will be parts of it that some readers will probably want to think about in relation to their own lives and the way they live them - but it's not overtly self-help. The story keeps moving at a steady pace to keep you engaged and the ending is unexpected but quite satisfying.

Too good!!!

Moi et ma femme on parle anglais et cette livre c genial pour reflexir sur notre vie au cotidien....

I started reading the book two days ago and was hooked to it. It's a real page turner. You want to know what happens next, and next and don't feel like putting the book down. I read Laurent Gounelle's previous book, ' The Man Who Wanted To Be Happy' and thought it was amazing. I gave it 5 stars and was waiting eagerly to read his new book, ' The man who risked it all'. Although it keeps the reader wondering about the unravelling of the exciting events, it's not as good as his previous book. I was disappointed with the plot of the story and didn't like the ending. Not many take home messages too compared to the previous book. I am comparing it with the previous book negatively, but still would give 4 stars as it's a very interesting book on its own. Well written, exciting and definitely deserves 4 stars (or more?).

j'aime cet article, qui va me permettre de lire en anglais cet auteur que j'apprécie, voir Laurent Gounelle ouvrages en français