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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1303.The_48_Laws_of_Power?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="The 48 Laws of Power" border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/photo.goodreads.com/books/1158120753m/1303.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1303.The_48_Laws_of_Power?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">The 48 Laws of Power</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/865.Robert_Greene">Robert Greene</a><br/><br/>
  <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/352727?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
  rating: 4 of 5 stars<br/>This is Machiavelli updated for the everyman (and woman). Robert Greene is educated as all get out and he puts it out there for everyone to see. Really, the only way you can make arguments for the positions he takes is by citing historical example, (i.e. the laws of power are immutable and unchanging and here's all my examples throughout history to explicate that). Machiavelli really only relied on his own times (Renaissance Italy which of course was populated with characters like Cesare Borge who were ripe for Machiavelli to canonize) and antiquity. Greene, on the other hand, talks about everyone from ancient Chinese warlords to Talleyrand to Thomas Edison. 
<br/>
<br/>This book is often marketed as some kind of self help book but it's much more than that. I don't know if the "48 Laws" are the only laws and, moreoever, I'm not sure they couldn't be condensed into fewer, more elegant, laws. BUT, what Greene has to say has caught on in a lot of circles (I read a story about Robert Greene in the <i>New Yorker</i> where he was hanging out with both 50 Cent and the dude who started American Apparel, Dov Charney. I wouldn't consider either of those guys my literary heroes or anything, but it is interesting that they have this fellow and his book(s) in common), and I think it's definitely worth reading.
  <br/><br/><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/33765?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

Justin's review
rating:
recommended for: Aspiring Ruthless Power Mongers/Everyone Else

This is Machiavelli updated for the everyman (and woman). Robert Greene is educated as all get out and he puts it out there for everyone to see. Really, the only way you can make arguments for the positions he takes is by citing historical example, (i.e. the laws of power are immutable and unchanging and here's all my examples throughout history to explicate that). Machiavelli really only relied on his own times (Renaissance Italy which of course was populated with characters like Cesare Borge who were ripe for Machiavelli to canonize) and antiquity. Greene, on the other hand, talks about everyone from ancient Chinese warlords to Talleyrand to Thomas Edison.

This book is often marketed as some kind of self help book but it's much more than that. I don't know if the "48 Laws" are the only laws and, moreoever, I'm not sure they couldn't be condensed into fewer, more elegant, laws. BUT, what Greene has to say has caught on in a lot of circles (I read a story about Robert Gre...more

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