Saisissez l'opportunité quand c'est à vous de jouer et de changer les choses: c'est une opportunité de mener et de vivre pleine votre vie.

A review of this type of book is really a mug's game, a veritable typing in the wind because...well, to quote the ads, your mileage may differ. Some will read this book and feel they have reached the Promised Land. Others will feel they have experienced nothing but pretty words and prettier pictures full of sound and promises and signifying nothing. It is that kind of book.

Let's back up.

My first encounter with Seth Godin (although I didn't know it at the time) was through a book the company force fed everyone in my department because they apparently felt it spoke to what our department needed. It left little mark on my memory, other than I remembered reading a book that did not speak to me at any level and that it got me an okay trade-in price at the used book store.

And then, through Tom Peters web page, I was pointed to Godin's site and daily blog. I was floored. Fascinating concepts and thoughts and ideas that applied far outside the realm of marketing. Things you could, if you had a warped enough mind, apply to any situation to help stimulate personal productivity, creativity, and all else that is good to have. At some point I made the connection to the book I had received and was hard pressed to understand how I could not have connected with the concepts. (We all grow; we all change; we all make mistakes.)

So, Godin puts out the new book and he himself has trouble describing it. And I take the bait. I love what he writes in his blog and I am intrigued as to what this new book will contain.

And within a few short pages I wonder why I bothered. It felt like someone took a series of blog posts and random thoughts and strung them together in a loosely defined theme ("It's your turn") – a theme of which, every once in a while, the author seemed to need to remind the reader and himself. To say I was disappointed was an understatement. I was smart enough to not read it all at once – to take pieces and let them sink in. And yet I found myself struggling to return, as if the investment of time was a waste. I was far from knocked senseless. In fact, my senses remained perfectly intact. Maybe I had been right about that first book after all.

And yet...

And yet...

And yet I found myself dog-earing pages and writing notes and taking nuggets away that I either used immediately or will be using later. As much as I was inclined to dislike what I was reading – as much as I was ready to dismiss it as surface content – I came away with much more than I what started with.

Be careful how you devour this book. The wrong attitude or mind set and you will fail. Consume it in one sitting and you will not have time to reflect. Dismiss it too soon and you will miss out.

I cannot say I loved it. And when I recommend it to others it will be with numerous caveats. But danged if it doesn't keep coming back to me when I least suspect it. ( )