An engaging, nuts-and-bolts breakdown of the financial side of entrepreneurship.
A detailed guide to disentangling three key elements of business.
In his latest, business consultant Duryee (Lead To Succeed, 2005, etc.) describes a familiar triangle: business owners, who believe that if their revenue and profits are healthy, banks should be willing to lend them money; bankers, who worry that business owners “may not understand the difference between profits and cash flow, and therefore will overly rely on debt to support growth”; and luckless certified public accountants caught in the middle, trying to get both sides to speak the same “language.” In this book, Duryee promises to resolve this age-old problem, providing prospective business owners with clear and easy-to-follow explanations of financial statements and how to apply them to business models, how to understand cash flow (which isn’t the same as profits, he points out), and how to develop forecast models for financial statements. He writes with clarity and authority even when he’s deep in the weeds of financial arcana: “Always use straight-line depreciation on your internally produced financial statements because accelerated depreciation artificially lowers both the value of your assets and your profit.” He correctly notes that many entrepreneurs start their businesses with passion and vision but precious little financial acumen. Overall, this book takes key concepts—everything from liquidity to accounts receivable—and skillfully renders their essentials. Although he may overestimate how quickly novices will be able to master such information, he makes it all immensely relatable by linking his ideas to lessons he’s learned in his own career as a consultant. Along the way, he offers case studies, bullet-pointed lists, and graphs to make sure that nothing is left to chance. Newcomers to the business world will consider this book a godsend, but even old hands will likely learn something from it.
An engaging, nuts-and-bolts breakdown of the financial side of entrepreneurship.Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-946978-17-2
Page Count: 274
Publisher: Best Seller Publishing, LLC
Review Posted Online: Sept. 4, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Brisk, sharp, and elegant.
Film critic and memoirist Sayre (Previous Convictions, 1995) recalls her astonishing circle of acquaintances in mid-1950s London.
“Like millions of young Americans with knapsacks and bicycles,” she writes, Sayre headed to England at 22 to find what London might hold. There her resemblance to any typical American youth ends. The daughter of a New Yorker writer, she was soon taken up by her parents’ London friends (a cross-section of the period’s intelligentsia that few 22-year-olds could ever dream of meeting) and enjoyed a five-year stay in the company of history makers. Her first apartment came courtesy of Arthur Koestler, Tyrone Guthrie hired her to research scripts for his theater company, critic John Davenport helped her navigate the London literary scene, and A.J. Liebling became her dinner companion. In the wrong hands, such a tale could be insufferably smug; happily, Sayre is a charming raconteur with a light comic touch that comes into play when she recalls such incidents as Graham Greene, outraged by a savage review from Liebling, running in circles around her and a companion who had been seen with Liebling earlier in the evening. Interleaved with tales of stars—Katherine Hepburn grousing about a friend’s rusty garden tools, Ingrid Bergman’s musings on Casablanca’s two final scenes—is fine political history. An extended chapter on the blacklisted Hollywood community gives vivid insight to the motivations of the exiles and provides an excellent précis of what was happening in the artistic community back home, long before most Americans had a comprehensive view of the anticommunist battle. “All this history was new to me. . . . About twenty years passed before it was publicly discussed in my own country.” Sayre is not above the tasty details, however; she lards her entire narrative with descriptions of who wore what and how their houses were decorated.
Brisk, sharp, and elegant.Pub Date: June 5, 2001
ISBN: 1-58243-144-2
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Counterpoint
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
A competent memoir about World War II Germany.
The story of a German family’s struggles during Hitler’s reign.
McIntosh attempts to explore–and perhaps atone for–the sins of Hitler’s Germany via this carefully related story of one family. Intimate tales of domestic drama mix with historical accounts of Hitler’s youth in Vienna, his entrance into German politics, rise to power and, ultimately, his demise. The author’s implication is clear–Hitler is a self-serving outsider who weasels his way, with more charm than integrity, into an essentially good nation, only to ruin it. McIntosh, a German born during Hitler’s rise, writes with a sense of contrition only truly available to those who directly experienced the dictator’s rule. However, she tends to insinuate her own perspective into her protagonists’ speech and thought. Her characters often speak as if they were reading from a 21st-century analysis of the crimes committed in Nazi Germany, possessing strong insight into the unfolding events. In the preface, McIntosh thanks a friend for ridding her manuscript of “Germanisms.” Though her writing remains free of such errors, it is clear that English is not her first language–the prose is clean but indicates that the composition cost her much time and effort. An able craftswoman, McIntosh has yet to elevate her writing to the level of art.
A competent memoir about World War II Germany.Pub Date: June 27, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-7414-3971-9
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
