Cohesive analysis of global developments

Found this an interesting listen. Explained the importance of energy, economy, and emergent nations and alliances. No issue with how it was read at all.

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Helen is a boss

She is an intellectual titan. Joins a lot of dots coherently and compellingly to explain how we have ended up where we are. Read this book now!

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A fascinating, smart book

This was an extraordinary book telling a complex yet familiar story. I found it compelling if depressing in its fatalism. Sadly I must highlight multiple problems in the narration. 1. Too fast! This is complex stuff & listening in the car meant I often found myself trying to digest one idea before the next one was rattled off. 2. Poor tone. I’m afraid the narrator’s tone can only be described as bedtime story mode. When you’re bouncing through a narration in a jaunty way without a clue what you’re reading because that bit of your brain is wandering off somewhere else. I really wish Thompson could have narrated because she is so obviously passionate about the subject matter and would have created emphasis in the right places rather than this singsong disappointment. 3. Shocking proofing. Did anyone listen to this before it was released? ‘Aggregate’ pronounced like ‘egregious’, ‘gilets jaunes’ becoming ‘gilets jeunes’, ‘de Tocqueville’ pronounced ‘de tok A vil’. There were so many other word mangles & mispronunciations but these stick out. I don’t blame the narrator for this - it must be hard to read a book with unfamiliar words, but who proof-listened to check for this stuff? Anyway tremendous book but wish I had hard copy so I could mark it up.

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Why so fast!?

Subject is fascinating, but the narration is just too fast to take it all in. I tried listening at reduced speed, but she sounded drunk, which was worse. Will probably have to buy the hardcopy.

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Dreadful narration undermines the book

It’s hard to know what to rate the narrative of this book because the narration is so bad that it distracts from the text. So many names are pronounced incorrectly that eventually I just gave up, because it became too irritating. de Tocqueville, Francois Hollande, BNP Paribas, Silvio Berlusconi… on and on it goes. It’s not like these are difficult names, or that it isn’t well-known how to pronounce them. But when it’s just one wrong after another, it emphasises the extent to which this book is read like it’s a manual, rather than a narrative. There is no understanding from the narrator as to what is being read, and as a result, if there is substance to the text it just washes over you.

Rarely do I get hours into a book and am unable to tell you a single concept that I have taken out of it; almost never do I give up on a book. But in this case, both of those things were true.

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2 people found this helpful

Geopolitical masterclass for the world today. .

An exceptional history of the current geopolitical issues in Ukraine and energy issues to come.

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Must-read Intellectual Triumph

An extraordinary feat of analysis bringing together energy, mentalist policy and democracy to make sense of the last hundred years of geopolitics and critically the today's geopolitical dramas. Brilliantly researched and moulded I to an accessible story. Let down somewhat by flat and badly-researched delivery.

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Great book, shame about the reading

This is a brilliantly written, in-depth, yet accessible look at geopolitics, spoiled by a mediocre reading performance. Mispronunciations and badly-scanned readings of sentences regularly made it a struggle for me to understand what the author was trying to communicate. I often wondered if the reading was being done by an AI, rather than by a human being who actually understood the sentences she was reading.

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1 person found this helpful

The reality of the complexity of geo politics

This is a very important book. It looks at the complexity of global trade, energy and politics. It shows how democracy walks a regular tightrope and that the recent problems with “losers consent” in the U.K., EU and especially in the US are a risk that needs to be dealt with. The history of energy is particularly important as it explains the relationships versions countries have to supply oil, gas etc. it looks at the fault lines in the EU and NATO which help explain many if the problems we see today.

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Outstanding

An incredible piece of work, that brings together so many elements to empower the reader to make an informed judgment on the current major geopolitical issues.

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