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NONE OF MY BUSINESS

Name: NONE OF MY BUSINESS
Author: P.J. O’Rourke
ISBN: 978-0-8021-2848-5

P.J. EXPLAINS MONEY, BANKING, DEBT, EQUITY, ASSETS, LIABILITIES, AND WHY HE'S NOT RICH AND NEITHER ARE YOU

by P.J. O’Rourke ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 4, 2018

As with most of O’Rourke’s books, a mix of the smart and the throwaway but fairly entertaining throughout.

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Noted wisenheimer O’Rourke (How the Hell Did This Happen? The Election of 2016, 2017, etc.) serves up a fan’s notes on “a blood sport that I greatly enjoy”—namely, the dismal science of economics.

Though a conservative on numerous mastheads and TV credits since the heyday of National Lampoon, the author isn’t reflexive in his cheerleading for capitalism; after all, he notes, it was capitalists who “hoovered my investment portfolio in the 2008 financial crisis.” Still, this is a mostly pro–free-market, conservative look at a complex subject that O’Rourke sometimes reduces to useful fundamentals—and that sometimes floats away on clouds of dumb abstraction. As to the former, the author points to the thought that the first thing a financial analyst needs to do is figure out how a company he or she is thinking of investing in makes money. In the instance of Enron, one mogul’s staff reported back that they were “utterly ignorant” even after studying the company up close for a month—a lesson, O’Rourke suggests, in the virtues of ignorance, or at least not proceeding until one is less ignorant than at the start. Where things get interesting is when the author turns subtly critical in the matter of corporations. As he notes, things got sticky in the financial realm when the banks sold themselves out to “clueless stockholders,” since the banks could then be comfortably managed by people who were clueless themselves. Of course, the whole business of corporate personhood is sticky. As for fundamentals, the author scores points with a sharp observation: The rise of credit cards suggests that the idea that goods and services seem sort of free if you don’t have to pay straightaway yields a topsy-turvy financial world, one whose craziness can logically be resolved only with the use of a “9mm Glock—VISA card of the future.”

As with most of O’Rourke’s books, a mix of the smart and the throwaway but fairly entertaining throughout.

Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-8021-2848-5

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Atlantic Monthly

Review Posted Online: June 26, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2018

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
A CRY FROM THE FAR MIDDLE
by P.J. O’Rourke

- BOOK REVIEW
HOW THE HELL DID THIS HAPPEN?
by P.J. O’Rourke

- BOOK REVIEW
THE BABY BOOM
by P.J. O’Rourke

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.