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Summary: This book provided insight into improving our world.
Review: Quinn provides insight into the stories of our culture and encourages the reader to think more deeply about where these stories came from and how true they really are. His points are made through questions and answer sessions with a young girl, which makes the book enjoyable to read. He doesn't give the reader all the answers, but he provides a place for us to start understanding the world we live in and the world we are destroying.
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Summary: Excellent Book!!
Review: I loved this book! As well as his earlier "Ismael". This book has totally awakened my brain and heart to some much needed thinking and awareness. It is as if, a lightbulb has gone on in my head and I am exclaiming "ahhaahh" . One of my favorite dialouges is whereby Ishmael is explaining to his pupil the concept of "locking up the food". That has become my new catch phrase at home when my husband or son complain about job/school, whatever. "Hey guys, it is all because we "lock up the food". This in turn has gotten the entire family to sit down and discuss the concepts of this book. Great learning and a thought provoking message as we enter the new millenium.
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Summary: Are you reading carefully enough?
Review: I wasn't going to type a review of this book, but something needs to be said. This is a sequel to Ishmael, not only because it was written after, but because it builds from ideas in the previous novel. My Ishmael begins with a basic review of principles the book is based on. It then proceeds into new territory with a new character who is more responsive to Ismael and reacts in a different way than previous characters. This is the book that assured me that Quinn wasn't suggesting a return to a 'primitive' lifestyle. But again, the focus of any Daniel Quinn book is to provoke you do develop new ideas of your own. It is not a 'how to' book, nor is it plot centered. Read this book with an open mind, and you might be suprised what it leaves you with.
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Summary: My Ishmael; a journey into your soul
Review: This was the most thought provoking book I've ever read. It has brought my consciousness to a higher lever. Its words and its message have been forever etched into my soul. Truly deserving of the rank of masterful. Brought about in such a way that can not offend, and in such a fashion as to make you think in ways you never thought possible. An improvement over Ishmael, which hardly seems possible. A wonderful retelling of Ishmeals teachings, but totally origional. A book without equal.
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Summary: Old territory; old literary technique
Review: Having read Ishmael, I looked forward with eager anticipation to this book. I had found the Story of B to be adequate, but it lacked the power of Ishmael perhaps for no other reason than it lacked the simplicity of Ishmael. Lack of simplicity is not something you can fault My Ishmael for. Unfortunately, the book is largely a retread of Ishmael in both intellectual content and literary technique...and there's only so much sanctimonious lecturing one can take from a gorilla.
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Summary: My Ishmael shoud be required reading for educators.
Review: A terrific companion book to "Ishmael." My only complaint is that it wasn't long enough, but I think that's probably the point: Daniel Quinn doesn't claim to have all the answers, and he expects each of us to do our part in furthering these ideas. Ishamel was the first Quinn book I read, and it rocked my world. I don't go a single day without thinking of Ishmael in some way, large or small. I believe that every educator in the "civilized" world should be required to read My Ishamel; if they don't get it the first time, then they should read it a second or third until they do understand. For a related but different slant on the ideas of Quinn's books, check out Mutant Message Down Under by Marlo Morgan. She takes us on a walkabout with the "real people," an aboriginal tribe in Australia. Five stars for that one too.
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Summary: Absolutely enlightening - you will view the world anew
Review: I have read the critical reviews of this book, and I have to say with all due respect, that those who criticize are reading this book with the wrong attitude. Quinn is not proposing a return to the hunter-gatherer lifestyle, nor is he suggesting that humans are unnatural organisms that are inherently wrong. He merely shines the light on simple flaws in our perspective, and with great hope and optimism provides a shining new world prospect. Whether or not you agree personally with Quinn, his book WILL make you think, and how can that be bad? Personally, it changed my life.
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Summary: Close, but not quite. . .
Review: I had to read this for a class last semester. The big question on everyone's mind (including the instructor) is how is it this gorilla NEVER gets grilled by anyone that has an even mildly thought provoking anthropological question? The Prof. was pitched the class at the last minute and this was on the agenda. Luckily, she finished before we did and was so unimpressed that we didn't even have to take the test! This book is to positive solutions as twinkies are to bicycle repair. If you really want to feel ecologically progressive, buy a book on solar power!
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Summary: Once again, Quinn shows that ANYONE can write a best seller.
Review: I fully hope everyone is forced to read this book and the book to which it is the sequal at one time or another simply to gain an understanding of how the "other side" thinks. Quinn manages to yet again turn humans into the heavy and all other forms of life into "nature". . . If humans are not natural, did we come from alien craft? If not, then we must have been created on and for this planet. If this is the case, then humans ARE NATURAL and therefore what we do is natural if it is instinctive. If our instinct is to survive on this planet, then how can our existence be wrong?!? Mr. Quinn, how do you propose we turn 6 billion people into "gatherers"? OH! Maybe we should stop healing the sick! YEAH!! Sheesh! Get a life. . .
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Summary: Inspirational
Review: In the prequel (Ishmael) the student comes to Ishmael with the feeling that we're all being "lied to" about something, and Ishmael proceeds to demonstrate what those lies are and where they come from in our culture. Now in My Ishmael, a different student comes along with a dream of travelling to another world to study how intelligent beings can live happily without destroying their planet. Ishmael demonstrates that this "other world" she's dreaming about is actually none other than our own ancestors on our own planet. Before our culture began taking over the world, humans were living in ways that worked well, ways that evolution had produced over hundreds of thousands of years of the "trial-and-error" process of natural selection. He demonstrates how we can study the cultures of these peoples to learn how to tackle just about any of our problematic worldwide issues such as overpopulation, education, competition, economy, crime, etc. He ends his teaching with a proposal for a "New Tribal Revolution" that is truly inspiring. I especially and wholeheartedly recommend the book to anyone who out there who is feeling lost in our culture, anyone who hates the pressure our culture puts on us to "find a direction in life." If you are someone like that, this book promises to give you inspiration and hope that you never would have dreamed of. On top of all this, the book is also a clever piece of fiction! Rock on, Daniel Quinn!
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