Rating: 
Summary: z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z
Review: Having done time on vintage-1980s/early 1990s bond trading floors, and in light of the many positive reviews posted here, I expected to love this book. I don't. I'm halfway through and I'm not sure I summon up the willpower to go further. I guess I'm bored with the style; way too many "essays" about bond sales and way too little plot. How the heck does Igino sell RTC bonds to accounts on credit hold? (Is this plot point picked up in the latter part of the book? Like I said, I'm not sure I'm interested enough to read on and find out.) "Liar's Poker" and "Fiasco" are perfectly capable of amusing, exposing and outraging audiences without resorting to abject nonsense. Those non-fiction narratives deliver what Bronson promises. Perhpas it's beause the latter works were written by authors who've been there and know first hand.
Rating:
Summary: Catch-22 It Ain't: A Book As Shallow as the Yuppie Soul
Review: I eagerly anticipated reading this novel after all the hype and was flabbergasted by how badly written it is; Bronson is an atrocious writer! After reading the first page, I said to myself, "I bet I can open BOMBADIERS anywhere and find something truly bad on the first sentence I read," and you know -- it's true -- every page is just chock-a-block with horrible writing that would make any self-respecting creative writing teacher scream. Of course, self-respecting creative writing teacher may be an oxymoron. Po Bronson is a graduate of San Francisco State Univ.'s M.F.A. creative writing program, and frankly, this novel, with its plethora of adverbs, its multiple point-of-view shifts within a chapter (sometimes the POV shifts from paragraph to paragraph) looks like the work of a college sophomore. I think Bronson's success has more to do with his good looks and the shallowness of Yuppies: just say "dollar bill" to a Yuppie and watch their eyes light up and their jowls loosen into a goofy, loose grin. I'm sure many of these child-like beings take great narcissitic delight in seeing their kind in print. This book has energy (which is why I rate it a two), but any comparisons to Joseph Heller's classic CATCH-22 other than my numerical grade of this travesty indicates that the reviewer never read Heller's novel or is him/herself a college sophomore. Atrocious!
Rating:
Summary: Comparing This To Liar's Poker Is A Joke
Review: I have read Liar's Poker, and Bombardiers, you are no Liar's Poker. Not even close. The characters are poorly developed, the dialogue is uneven, the scenarios are utterly and completely unrealistic. All in all, an incredibly painful read. If you haven't read Liar's Poker and are considering reading this book, read Liar's Poker instead; if you have already read Liar's Poker and are considering reading this book, read Liar's Poker again. It's that bad.
Rating:
Summary: z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z
Review: I read this author's second book The First $20 Million is Always the Hardest first. I really enjoyed that novel as it involves characters I can relate to in an industry I'm in (high tech start-ups). Naturally, I was a little apprehensive about reading this novel as it centers on Wall Street and bond trading. I'm not a business person, but this is my reaction after reading the book: A lot of the banking concepts such as bonds, savings and loans, securities I didn't fully understand. But kudos to the author for structuring his prose in such a way that the specifics of bond trading is not important in moving the plot forward. It's the characters and their personal ideosyncracies and relationships with one another that grip the reader. The pace of the novel can only be described as frenetic, like a movie that incessantly cuts away to scene after scene every couple of minutes. To have an author that is able to provide the reader with a 360-degree panoramic view into the heart and life of an industry while at the same time satirizing it is pure genius. As a quick summary of the story: Sidney Geeder is the king of mortgages. He's the best bond salesman Atlantic Pacific (AP) has. He's also a couple of months away from retiring rich with stock options. Sid's hatred for the bonds he sells is what drives him to be the best. At the same time a new kid named Mark Igino (aka Eggs Igino) joins the company. Egg's is a natural salesman and also somewhat of a renegade for not having been exposed to the house rules of AP. As expected, Eggs turns the place upside down. Sid and Eggs quickly form a friendship (more like an alliance). Naturally, AP wants to control its employees, and how it does it is the focus of this story along with a supporting cast that'll keep you grinning till the end. Truly engaging! The author has an uncanny talent for humor in the subtleties of each character. A statement as absurd as "he lost his job because of his need to floss" generates complete empathy on the part of the reader after reading through this novel. I would recommend this book to any person with any background. LEAP rating (each out of 5):
============================
L (Language) - 4 (well-crafted dialogue keeps your mind off the technicalities of bond trading)
E (Erotica) - 1 (let's just say, bond salesman have fun too)
A (Action) - 0 (n/a)
P (Plot) - 3 (fairly predictable ending, it's the characters that are important)
Rating: 
Summary: Ingenious...
Review: I read this author's second book The First $20 Million is Always the Hardest first. I really enjoyed that novel as it involves characters I can relate to in an industry I'm in (high tech start-ups). Naturally, I was a little apprehensive about reading this novel as it centers on Wall Street and bond trading. I'm not a business person, but this is my reaction after reading the book: A lot of the banking concepts such as bonds, savings and loans, securities I didn't fully understand. But kudos to the author for structuring his prose in such a way that the specifics of bond trading is not important in moving the plot forward. It's the characters and their personal ideosyncracies and relationships with one another that grip the reader. The pace of the novel can only be described as frenetic, like a movie that incessantly cuts away to scene after scene every couple of minutes. To have an author that is able to provide the reader with a 360-degree panoramic view into the heart and life of an industry while at the same time satirizing it is pure genius. As a quick summary of the story: Sidney Geeder is the king of mortgages. He's the best bond salesman Atlantic Pacific (AP) has. He's also a couple of months away from retiring rich with stock options. Sid's hatred for the bonds he sells is what drives him to be the best. At the same time a new kid named Mark Igino (aka Eggs Igino) joins the company. Egg's is a natural salesman and also somewhat of a renegade for not having been exposed to the house rules of AP. As expected, Eggs turns the place upside down. Sid and Eggs quickly form a friendship (more like an alliance). Naturally, AP wants to control its employees, and how it does it is the focus of this story along with a supporting cast that'll keep you grinning till the end. Truly engaging! The author has an uncanny talent for humor in the subtleties of each character. A statement as absurd as "he lost his job because of his need to floss" generates complete empathy on the part of the reader after reading through this novel. I would recommend this book to any person with any background. LEAP rating (each out of 5):
============================
L (Language) - 4 (well-crafted dialogue keeps your mind off the technicalities of bond trading)
E (Erotica) - 1 (let's just say, bond salesman have fun too)
A (Action) - 0 (n/a)
P (Plot) - 3 (fairly predictable ending, it's the characters that are important)
Rating: 
Summary: Loved it, learned from it
Review: I taught a business finance class this Spring and offered my students extra-credit for reading this book. My purpose was for them to learn more about finance while being entertained. This book is so funny that I shared it with friends (physics grad students) who loved it as much as I do.
Rating:
Summary: Funny, Hilariuos, Hysterical!
Review: I thought this was a great book. It had me laughing real hard and almost to the point of tears. It's Catch-22-ness made it a fun read.
Rating:
Summary: Still Bronson's best effort to date
Review: I've read all of Bronson's books. Unlike earlier reviewers, I'm still partial to his fiction, and of the two books he's put out there, "Bombardiers" (vs. "The First $20 Million...") is by far the better work. Yes, it's funny, it's biting, it has that "Catch 22" thing going on...but it's also *very* educational. Bronson really understands markets and does a great job here getting their complexities down on paper in an engaging, even riveting, way - even when it involves something as trivial as the office breakfast. Very humorous and very highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Rip-Roaring Fun
Review: It was a filthy profession, but the money was addicting and one addiction led to another... and so the novel begins and takes you on a journey into the absurd world of high finance, where the stakes are high, the traders are insane, the institutional customers are glory-hungry hacks, and the money become the grease that that keeps its bizzare machine humming at breakneck velocity. Bronsonsuccesfully takes the most absurd elements of high finance and weaves it into a cautionary tale of the price the new information economy extracts from its front-line foot soldiers. Sid's sales pitch of the Lincoln Convertible Bonds to a hapless fund manager alone is worth the price of the book -- where he browbeats and ridicules a timid portfolio manager into taking a $5 million position in a bond designed to finance the hostile takeover of a small ... country. Blisteringly hilarious, and darkly cynical it's the sort of work that good satirists should aspire to.
Outrageous and fun for thosein the industry ... and a fair warning for ambitious college students wanting a shot at the glory in the capital of capitalism of investment banking.
Rating: 
Summary: Amusing but Derivative
Review: It's an entertaining read, but as an earlier reviewer noted, Catch-22 has been written already. A good beach read, but don't look to this one for insight into the world of finance. Joseph Heller can rest quiet in his grave!
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