Books : The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dream

Rating: - Inspiring & Enlightening
Wow! I have just finished reading this book and cannot praise it highly enough. As others have said you need to be in a specific frame of mind and desire certain dreams & aspirations to really benefit from this read, if i had read this a few years ago i may not got as much out of it.

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Rating: - Not quite Harry Potter and Marmite
JK Rowling's stories of the bespectacled wizard are simple, engaging, easily digested and, most importantly, re-connected kids with books and their imagination! Coelho has certainly helped do the same for professionals worldwwide. Coelho is to management literature what Rowling is to fiction and shares her phenomenal success because he connects with the parts few authors reach with his blend of simple storytelling largely following well established patterns explained by the "sage" Joseph Campbell's mono myth theories. Rather like Mr Potter and that iconic savoury spread Marmite,however, folk tend to either love or hate Coelho's "naive" literature. It certainly seems to fill a spiritual gap, it's very accessible and thousands are willing to proudly display his works on their corporate self-development bookshelves. But if you're looking for writing with hefty substance, deep insights or brassy punchlines don't be surprised if you find his work a little lightweight. There again - can his millions of fans be wrong? Take a nibble, go on.......!

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Rating: - A simple masterpiece
When I was a novice reader this was thee best book I ever read... Puring with original insights, but a year later after reading (Peaceful warrior, conversations with God & others, I tried for a second read & to my shock it is now like reading a child's book (its too simple)
But I'll never forget the first time reading this treasure!

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Rating: - Too thin to be satisfying
I approached this book with optimism, as it had been recommended by a friend, but I found it an incredibly unrewarding read. It has a simple (okay, nothing wrong with that) story and claims to be some sort of fable through which, apparently, greater truths are exposed. It struck me as pretentious and trivial. I also thought the writing style was weak and uneven, at the same time as being painfully self-conscious, almost as if the author had decided 'I need to write a book to appeal to millions of undemanding readers.' Perhaps I'm missing something, though, because I seem to remember that Nicola Horlick chose it as her book for a desert island. A review by her would be interesting.

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Rating: - Yawn
This book was passed around a large group of my friends and I during a pool holiday and opinion was, sufficed to say, mixed! Some loved it, some loathed it: I fall into the later category. I found it preachy and dull and reminded me of Sunday School lessons (not a good thing!)

The saving grace was that it only took a couple of hours to read and it passed some time by the poolside. If you've got time to kill and NOTHING better to do then sure, give it a go and see what you think for yourself.