REVIEW for Lost in the Meritocracy

A big thank you goes out to Jess at Random House Canada for kindly, kindly sending me this great little book.

TITLE: Lost in Meritocracy

AUTHOR: Walter Kirn

GENRE: Memoir

RATING: 4 Stars

http://www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780385521284

I have to admit that I starting reading this book, in part because of the absolutely "uppety" book title and the kind of cool book cover. Yeah, I know not great reasons to read a book - but hey! I am thrilled that I picked this one up.

Basically, Walter Kirn has lived and gone to school in a totally different environment than I did. I have always been curious to see what it is like to have been "Ivy Leagued" educated as the closest "higher end" education we have here is McGill University - which has produced, among others, William Shatner - although McGill is well known, it is hardly considered "up there" with the Ivy League.

What I liked about Kirn's book, in part, is that he spends about as much time bragging about his overeducation as he does putting it down - so I never really get a feel as to whether he is proud of it or wishes he had gone to a local college. On the other hand, Kirn confirmed something for me that I long suspected - that school smarts is NOT more important than street smarts.... Kirn does a wonderful job, in this at times, hilarious, poignant somewhat sad novel of in turns putting himself and his life down into the gutter and at times sounding like a real ivy league snob.

Some of his stories are hilarious and some are actually quite judgmental which, I think, fits in very well with the overall tone of the book.

This really is a memoir about a man who has had a long "life" learning curve to finally realize that he isn't that educated "after all".

I loved, loved this book and read it in two sittings - kudos for the author and his honest book.