Customer Review
- Reviewed in the United States on February 4, 2013After devouring and enjoying Sieden's previous book about Bucky Fuller, " Buckminster Fuller's Universe: His Life and Work " (1989), I was delighted to see that the author had a new book about Fuller released in 2012.
The original book, a fully-fledged biography on Fuller, was originally written in the 80s, and was therefore slightly deficient in connecting Bucky's ideas to contemporary environmental sustainability concerns. I immediately purchased "A Fuller View", hoping that Sieden had managed to adapt Bucky's ideas to 21st century.
Upon receiving the book I was surprised to learn that the book is mostly written by an array of guest authors, who each share their favourite Buckminster Fuller quote, and elaborate on how it has affected their view of the world. This was a real disappointment to me, as I had enjoyed Sieden's role as sole "Bucky Interpreter" in his 1989 Biography. I was disappointed that we would be mostly unguided by Sieden this time around.
A bigger problem soon became apparent to me: because the book is written by an array of guest writers, there is much duplication within the book, as concepts such as "trimtab" are needlessly explained and re-explained to the reader.
The book is designed as a celebration of Buckminster Fuller, with none of the writers saying a critical word about his inventions or ideas. Unfortunately, all of this praise without level-headed explanation/evaluation of Bucky's ideas makes the whole exercise feel forced and hollow. It's strange how some of Bucky's more far-fetched ideas (such as the idea that humans arrived on Earth from outer space, and that all other life devolved from man) are completely ignored by these one-eyed biographers.
I was mightily disappointed by the majority of guest writers chosen for "A Fuller View". Most seem to fit into the category of 'new age' entrepreneurs, who run programs to encourage clients to unlock the potential of imagination. Fair enough, but I was hoping for more of a scientific/engineering look at Bucky's ideas. Some of the pieces went too far into the 'self promotion' space, with the point of their articles being more about THEIR work than Bucky's. Often the biographies of the authors (which follow each chapter) felt longer than the pieces themselves!
Unfortunately Sieden seemed to be asleep at the wheel in his role as editor, unwilling to say 'NO' to these new-age guest columnists. The end result is a fluffy book which was a chore to read, and adds almost nothing to the knowledge of "Buckminster Fuller's Universe".
I do not give one star reviews lightly, but cannot emphasise how disappointing this book was to me. I simply want to warn potential customers to avoid this book and instead turn to Sieden's previous book "Buckminster Fuller's Universe".
{By the way, I am suspicious about the current 20 five-star reviews on Amazon for this product (versus one two-star review). Did the publisher/author encourage friends/colleagues to spam Amazon? I can't imagine anyone finding this a perfect book.}
