A Working Stiff's Manifesto: A Memoir of Thirty Jobs I Quit, Nine That Fired Me, and Three I Can't Remember

Rating:
Summary: Read it on the Job!
Review: Although the book doesn't quite live up to the title, since it's such a slim work, it still will provide much enjoyment as you read through the horrors the author has experienced in the workplace. Although most people on the planet have some form of this book inside them waiting to come out, Levison took up the ax & did it with a great deal of self-depricating humor. Read it on the Job for some participatory reading...

Rating:
Summary: nicely done
Review: I liked this book. It's short, tightly written, and interesting. You can finish it in the time it takes to watch a movie.

Rating:
Summary: A hilarious book
Review: In this hilarious book, Levinson points out the aburdities of the general workplace with great wit - it may not be Nietzsche, and he may exaggerate his experiences, but the writing would be pretty dry otherwise. To those who decry Levinson for having a poor attitude, I have to say that it's hard to have a good attitude when your bosses treat you like a slave and you're nothing more than a cog in the proverbial machine; it's a nice guilty pleasure to read about his vindictive actions against abusive employers. He has simply not bought into the protestant work ethic that one profits when he or she works hard - in most cases, it's only the bosses that do the profitting. The fact that he has this book published as well as a novel just proves that he has managed to rise above his past situations of brain-dead employment and has found an occupation that he enjoys. I hope to read more of Levinson's works in the future.

Rating:
Summary: Funniest Book I Ever Read!!!
Review: Laugh out loud hysterical!!! Once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down until I finished...then I read it all over again. Depiction of "a working stiff" is right on the money.

Rating:
Summary: Pungent Slacker Take on Job Market
Review: Levison's book belongs to the classic "work sucks" canon, including the film Office Space, Bentley Little's horror novel The Ignored, and Magnus Mills' mysterious novel The Restraint of Beasts. As Levison recounts his hellish jobs, we see a man too smart and too proud to subject himself to Groupthink, "team player" sycophantism, sadistic, arbitrary employers, and jobs that are clearly designed to humiliate, dehumanize, and impoversih the employee. His stories and anecdotes make for compelling, page-turning reading and forces you in the end to question what you're willing to put up just so you can tell yourself you're "gainfully employed."

Rating:
Summary: Pungent Slacker Take on Job Market
Review: Levison's book belongs to the classic "work sucks" canon, including the film Office Space, Bentley Little's horror novel The Ignored, and Magnus Mills' mysterious novel The Restraint of Beasts. As Levison recounts his hellish jobs, we see a man too smart and too proud to subject himself to Groupthink, "team player" sycophantism, sadistic, arbitrary employers, and jobs that are clearly designed to humiliate, dehumanize, and impoversih the employee. His stories and anecdotes make for compelling, page-turning reading and forces you in the end to question what you're willing to put up just so you can tell yourself you're "gainfully employed."

Rating:
Summary: Down and out (with a degree)
Review: The lamest joke I know summarizes the repetitious problems faced by this intelligent but despondent worker and author: What is the number one question asked by liberal arts majors after graduation? Would you like fries with that? Much of the material in this short book is an honest appraisal of the travails faced by the American worker, and has been discussed in similar volumes such as the recently popular "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America." But this material is also balanced by the personal motivational and ethical problems faced by a guy who (among other things) steals from his employers, job hops with no other focus than simply paying the rent, and who is almost cripplingly cynical. Lain's English degree clearly was not wasted however, because this book is laugh out loud funny in parts, and contains compelling descriptions and appraisals of people and environs throughout.

Rating:
Summary: Down and out (with a degree)
Review: The lamest joke I know summarizes the repetitious problems faced by this intelligent but despondent worker and author: What is the number one question asked by liberal arts majors after graduation? Would you like fries with that? Much of the material in this short book is an honest appraisal of the travails faced by the American worker, and has been discussed in similar volumes such as the recently popular "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America." But this material is also balanced by the personal motivational and ethical problems faced by a guy who (among other things) steals from his employers, job hops with no other focus than simply paying the rent, and who is almost cripplingly cynical. Lain's English degree clearly was not wasted however, because this book is laugh out loud funny in parts, and contains compelling descriptions and appraisals of people and environs throughout.

Rating:
Summary: Well written and entertaining
Review: This book is really, really funny. I tip my hat to you Iain ! Please start working on the sequel !

Rating:
Summary: Too true and too funny
Review: This book is very well written and extremely funny.

I have worked in several blue collar jobs and can testify that this book has the ring of truth to it.

I absolutely love the part about working in the stainless steel room on the fishing ship with the "Panic Button".

John L. White, author "I'm in Debt, Over 40, With No Retirement Savings, HELP!"