Through more than a dozen illustrative examples looking at challenges overcome by founders of Hotels.com, Spanx and others,...
A serial entrepreneur reveals the skills and thrills behind building a successful start-up.
Struhl’s energetic first book encourages would-be entrepreneurs to seize opportunity and enter into the world of start-ups. Each chapter centers on one theme of advice, such as how to vet a new concept or take on industry giants, with Struhl providing examples from his own companies or those of his friends. Throughout the book, the stories of these businesses are specific, interesting and often amusing—as when the author regales his brash yet successful move to partner with Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and Apple to distribute specialty paper samples. Struhl portrays himself as a “high powered” businessman and his aggressive style will likely pump up readers. However, there are places in the book where the tone verges on elitist, such as the anecdote about a colleague who starts a private jet service with support from Warren Buffett. In other instances, the author’s exceptional networking makes his success seem far out of reach for fledgling business owners; through his colleagues, Struhl meets the visionary behind the candy store in FAO Schwarz and he gets a call as soon as a particular poster company he admired goes up for sale. Halfway through the book, the reader begins to feel as if everything will keep falling into place, but then the author does something admirable: He describes struggles and expensive failures. Prospective investors change terms at the last minute. An initial public offering goes awry. A partner abandons a business deal, resulting in the loss of millions of dollars in legal fees. Despite the flops that would terrify a new entrepreneur, Struhl forges on with enthusiasm, reminding readers that failures happen—but the opportunity for success can be worth the risk.
Through more than a dozen illustrative examples looking at challenges overcome by founders of Hotels.com, Spanx and others, Struhl infuses readers with optimism that they too can launch a successful start-up.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2010
ISBN: 978-1453780619
Page Count: 234
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 20, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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