OnlineBookClub.org

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Learn From the Best" by Abraham Kurland.]

Learn From The Best is a non-fiction work by Abraham Kurland.

The author hooks you right off the bat by telling you that you can be a winner. He issues the challenge to change your mindset and reveals many truths he's learned along his journey.

He stresses working smarter, not harder as one of the best ways to reach your goals. At the start, the book appears to be written in an easy language, not preachy or condescending. Much like talking to a mentor and listening to good advice. As the reader delves deeper, however, the content seems to change its focus away from a more mainstream audience. Not everyone thinks in terms of equations and the average reader may find this confusing.

The book promises to improve almost every aspect of your life, if you read and follow the author's suggestions. While some of his tips are relatively easy to do, and should produce favorable results, others are complicated and in some cases, possibly unsafe.

For example, caution is warranted before taking his health advice. Suggesting someone who is ill use the book's 'trial and error' method as opposed to consulting a qualified health professional first is potentially harmful. The same goes for supplements and certain types of exercise. These are best left to qualified experts.

At the beginning of the book, the author describes his credentials, which aren't really credentials at all. When credentials are mentioned, one generally expects to see something tangible listed, like a college degree- which he indicates later in the book he doesn't have. He claims he has learned a lot from listening to smart people. This is valuable, but not exactly a credential.

He does considerable bragging, while mentioning a few times he doesn't like to brag. I don't begrudge him that right. Based on the ideas presented, it's obvious he's extremely intelligent.

One thing he did brag about was writing the book without consulting an editor, and he really should have. The book is replete with frustrating and distracting parenthetical phrases. The vast majority of these should have been incorporated into their respective sentences, or omitted altogether. The book has no table of contents, which should be a part of any non-fiction work. Each new chapter should start on a new page. It appears the author selected Times New Roman font and may want to consider a different one that is easier to read. It could use a copy edit for the occasional missing words and punctuation.

One portion of the book I found confusing was a section in the middle entitled, Wealth Isn't A Significant Part of Happiness (Optional Reading). Why is it optional? Does the author want it to be read or not?

The examples included in the book don't always seem to illustrate the point the author is trying to make.

At only 72 pages, the book is shorter than it could be. Perhaps doing a little more work expanding the author's ideas and focusing his examples more on what he's trying to say would entice readers to absorb more of the content.

I'm rating this book two out of four stars, because it did have some good points, such as, you only get to run your life one time, and everyone only gets one reputation. These are both noteworthy statements not often seen in print. Also because I liked how he honestly described his addiction to video games and drugs, and points out many things about addiction the average person might not have realized.

Readers looking to solve their major life issues may not get everything they hope for in this book. It is still an interesting read.

Mr. Kurland states he plans to write more books in the future, and I look forward to reading them.

He describes what he has learned so far and plans future books to describe what he learns.

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Learn From the Best
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Like K_Espen's review? Post a comment saying so!

First, let me say that I appreciate you taking the time to read my book.

I agree that I did end up bragging too much, so I decided to take almost all of that out.

However, a lot of what you say is incorrect. First of all, I did graduate college (3.7 GPA from Brandeis University, a top tier school). I never said otherwise, and in fact, I'm pretty sure that during my story it clearly states that "after college" and "during college", so not sure why you'd think that I didn't. I just don't think having a college degree is an important credential.

Furthermore, I never said not to listen to experts; I stated that many supposed "experts" are not actually experts at all. For example, I'd guess that only 20-30% of nutritionists actually know a significant amount about nutrition.

As for editing, that's just my style of writing. I've used parenthesis the way it was meant to be used: for information that's not very important, but still important enough to include. Also, a lot of concepts in my book are hard to understand, so I've used parenthesis to expand on ideas and concepts.

Thanks for your review. I've edited my book a lot since I've uploaded it here and am still continuing to do so.

I enjoyed reading your review. You brought up a few good points. The book looks very interesting. As for the section about bragging, here's my two cents: I haven't read the book, but sometimes what some may view as bragging, others may view as basic statements. Different strokes for different folks.