Language Notes
Text: English, Italian (translation)
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Editorial Reviews
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Dated and very outdated,
By
This review is from: The Coming Dark Age (Paperback)
As the author says, "It is a manifesto, a call, a sermon -- delivering its somber discourse in the manner of Luigi Einaudi, who regarded his last writings as useless even before the public had delivered the same verdict."
Well, let me make that verdict formal: I did not find this book worth reading. The main reason why I read it was that it was quoted in some other post-apocalyptic books, among them Lucifer's Hammer. The enigmatic and authoritative sounding quotes mislead me to think that the overall book would be interesting - not so. The book is very old and outdated. Many of the opinions and predictions are either quaint or trivial, and others are just silly. The little that makes sense, e.g. modern society is complex and complex systems are prone to large unpredictable failures, is better said by other authors. Here is representative quote: "In the year 2000 Swedish officials will be governing New York, Moscow, Berlin, and Paris" (p. 174). Yeah, right, that's how it was back in 2000 :) The first 80% of the book is formally sounding but overly theoretical discussion of various reports by ancient AT&T officials or musings about 1960s power outages and traffic jams. This is the least interesting part. Then there are a couple of short chapters towards the end about how the coming dark age will be very feudal and personal allegiances will be the only form of power. This is the mildly interesting part, but frankly nothing truly thought provoking. The author does not make a logical connection between the fragility of certain complex systems (first 80% of the book) and the structure of the future society (the end of the book) so it feels disjointed. There is nothing actionable or new that could be learned from this book. Something like Kunstler's Long Emergency would be a far better read. Overall, the book is poorly written and very outdated. Not recommended, unless you are an intellectually masochistic book worm.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Does the financial breakdown bolster Vacca's "Coming Dark Age?",
By
This review is from: The Coming Dark Age (Paperback)
I am re-reading this book after many years. Certainly it makes lots of stark predictions, not grounded in the normal data and authorities. Its sobering message, however, is a bit more plausible these days. While you are waiting for your stocks to rebound, give this book a read.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Good but dry,
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: The Coming Dark Age (Hardcover)
A good book with very good explanations as to why things fall apart. It is . . . a bit dry. Definitely not a novel, but not bad. Not bad at all.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
