Customer Reviews

The Wages of Genius

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a fun book. At once, it humanizes Einstein and satirizes the "analysts" and others who bought into the dotcom mantra. As one reviewer analogized, this is "The Confederacy of Dunces" turned loose in Silicon Valley. The result is hilarious and the prose is magnificent.

This hilarious and witty post-mortem of the "new economy" revolutionary who balked at the traditional business model, substituting promise and potential for profitability, uses the father of modern physics and a modern-day delusional self proclaimed genius as an excellent analogy to keep the reader entertained on every page. I cannot wait for the movie and can already visualize several prominent actors portraying the complex yet loveable characters in this tome.

This is a MUST READ !!!

In "The Wages of Genius" Greg Mone without a doubt captures the mood of the people and companies in the Bay Area during the height of the Internet boom. His characterization of the 'synergistic' web company Gleebs is simply dead on the mark, and the employees of Gleebs are caricatures of caricatures. To be honest, however, the creators of startup.com and others have already demonstrated much of this. But what Greg really does differently and what makes the book well worth reading are the vignettes throughout the book that defy explanation. From the story of Edward's birth to his daily 'commutes' while in grad school (not to mention the unbelievably funny company wide meeting towards the end of the novel) there is a depth of humor, both ironic and subtle, that movies and NPR stories are unable to capture. I congratulate Greg on this first novel and I look forward to reading many more.

A subtle, yet scathing indictment of contemporary business life. Mr. Mone adeptly points out America's paranoid focus on the "commercial" individual. The author is uniquely close to the e-business wave, while at the same time cooly detached and brilliantly satirical. Office daydreamers will see the "Edward" in themselves! Rarely can an author effectively grasp the forefront of pop culture and relate it so creatively to our scientific history.

The Wages of Genius

I enjoyed entering the mind of "greatness" and experiencing first-hand the mental workings of a young, self-proclaimed genius who fancies himself the most logical heir to the throne of Albert Einstein. "The Wages of Genius" is Gregory Mone's engaging, humorous, thought-provoking and inventive first novel in which he deftly pulls the reader into the spiraling black hole of two realities in collision: the world of business and the inner world of the book's main character, Edward Weston.

The unbearable weight of Edward's intelligence, and his accompanying dilemma as to how best convince the rest of the world to acknowledge his unique gift, leaves Edward's daily perceptions in a fog of misinterpretation and impatient despair. The reader too becomes wholly absorbed in Edward's maze of first-person observations and his sometimes illogical yet always entertaining contemplations.

In an atmosphere of multi-layered bewilderment, Edward Weston searches for his personal `castle in the air': the opportunity to prove to himself and to the rest of society that he is undoubtedly Einstein's equal. Leaving graduate school at Berkeley, Edward is hired by an Internet company where he quite imaginatively muses on the re-shaping of virtually everything that crosses his path in the world of business. In the process, Mone subtly steers the reader onto an Einstein-like ride through time, shifting the focus from past to present to the future, and even interjecting alternate possible realities in Edward's existence. Mone seamlessly crafts these with Edward's comparisons of how the macrocosmic laws of physics are consistently at work within the microcosmic daily activities of business.

In addition, each of the twenty chapters in "The Wages of Genius" opens with a brief historical documentation of the life of Albert Einstein, thus allowing the reader to: 1) find comparative relevance (or irrelevance) to the goings-on in Edward's life, and 2) periodically come back to solid ground from Edward's otherwise lofty mindscape in which the balance of this story resides.

This novel is well worth seeking out not only for its accurate, nonfiction scientific material excellently fused into a fictional tale, but for the admirable and well-intentioned young man in whose mind it becomes sheer pleasure to inhabit for a time.

John Roman

Really inventive take on the dot-com boom. Uses Einstein as a metaphor for his protagonist in a way that fleshes out all the ridiculousness of the new economy. Uses wit and satire in a way that's refreshing to read in that it's understated (meaning it doesn't beat you over the head with gratuitous complexity to prove to you that it's smart and witty). Would definitely recommend to anyone who wants more than a fluffy beach read but still likes the pacing and character development of a page-turner.

Mone's debut is a wonderful collection of amusing characters, engaging scenes, and authentically interesting observations about how human minds work, woven together into a thoroughly satisfying read. There is a lot under the surface of this book that can be missed in the first time through. I'm looking forward to diving back in for a third time.

I was hoping the book would get where it was trying to go - but it never did. Marginally funny. An excellent first effort and I wish the author success in the future. But I wouldn't really recommend this to anyone.