I love this book

[Lindsey]

Probably one of the best books I have read this year. Informative yet entertaining. If you enjoy historical and political reads- then I highly suggest this book

[Daniel]

I agree this book is awsome. Although I do question the writer's motive inspite of his revelance.

[C]

This book hardly read any better than touristic travel writing. It could have been about 1/3 the length and proved its inconsequential point. There was nothing revealing or nearly as cloak and dagger as his tone or the jacket or implies. If you are into reading about how "neat" other people's travel experiences were, then pick this one up. If you are looking for an insider's analysis of a new global order, revealing intimate details of a world you could not find in the Wall Street Journal o r the New York Times, then pick this book up. I hope his anthropological stuff is better.

[Risa]

I largely agree with Chris. Furthermore, I thought this book read like an expanded mea culpa, with Perkins listing his litany of sins and asking the reader to forgive him.

[lixy]

i just have this to say...http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/15/boo...

[Spandana]

one of the best confession ever get.. must read book

[fourtriplezed]

I agree with the critics. I had high hopes for this after listening to a Radio Interview with the author but in the end it was very lightweight. As Risa said an expanded mea culpa. Anyone looking for something revelatory will be disappointed in my opinion.

[Liz]

I found it quite revealing about corporate skullduggery and the US complicity in stealing resources from other countries. the author could have presented himself in a better light, but he didn't. Yes, a mea culpa

[Daniel]

4ZZZ wrote: "I agree with the critics. I had high hopes for this after listening to a Radio Interview with the author but in the end it was very lightweight. As Risa said an expanded mea culpa. Anyone looking f..."

Capsule review: The DaVinci Code for Democracy Now! listeners. Pretentious junk food.

I first heard about this book from a friend who heard it promo'd on NPR (should have been my first warning sign) as a tell-all by some guy who was recruited by the NSA to snooker foreign governments into various construction boondoggles and development scams, and some other kind of ecomonic espionage or soemthing. So, I read the book, and Perkins just has some story about a sexy woman (the sexy, often exotic women are all over this book) who slept with him and got him to meet some vaguely NSA-ish person, and then boom, he's working for some shady consulting group that essentially pushes contruction boondoggles on foreign governments as a way of recycling petrodollars back to the US. That's it. No details about his actual relation to the government or the intelligence/policymakming apparatus. No names, no details, nothing except sex leading to a cushy job.

Also, some fairly obvious errors and slop thrown in. For example, he buys into some myths about Chavez and creates some of his own, IE saying that HCF "dissolved the VZA'n congress," which sounds like a repeal of democracy, when in fact it was a vote of the Venezuelan people that created a new constitution and government structure.

The book follows a cycle of Perkins supposedly getting sick of all the scummmy things he is doing, saying "how can I go on getting paid so much to do such terrible things and sleeping with all these beautiful, exotic women? I have to quit!" And then he sleeps with another beautiful, exotic woman, or quits for a while, or keeps working. It doesn't really matter, because soon the cycle starts again. Whatever.

And what makes it sickening is now Perkins gets to do the Demcoracy Now! circuit and tell adoring audiences how awful he feels now, having made all that money and banged all these hot women, and, oh please, won't someone in the audience help me soothe my tortured, sensitive conscience?

What a creep. John Perkins is a flaky fraud and his scam makes me want to vomit.

Instead of writing this book, John Perkins could have done a short article and a letter to Penthouse and saved everyone involved a lot of wasted time and breath.

[Awalina]

This book opens a conspiracy that made the MNC. Yup the real domination of the capitalists in countries rich in natural resources!

[Elite]

This book was one of the inspirations for me to write Splitting Pennies - great work. Hate to see all the detraction, the book explains the industry.

[Bobby]

Fact or fiction, light or heavy, it is a true eye-opener into the clandestine nature of these so-called protectionist institutions - that manipulate countries for the gain of corporate individuals who in turn control governments. I read this great book ages ago and it looks (sadly) like a lot of the things depicted (fact or fiction) are actually coming to light...