Rating: 
Summary: World-Class FRAUD!!
Review: This Lenz guy, a supposed "World-Class Snowboarder" is/was a complete fraud. (...) Anyway, I've been riding for years now and if you've stepped on a board and you think this book is gonna offer you something - think again. It's a shame that this guy climbed on the bandwagon when snowboarding got popular and decided to include it in his "spiritual journey". (...)STAY AWAY FROM THIS BOOK - IT IS PURE EVIL!
Rating: 
Summary: Fiction with a true message
Review: This is a good book for those who have an interest in eastern studies.Lenz uses fiction to teach the very real basics of buddism.Let's face it, most of us need a little surgar with our medicine. The story is intertaining without being preachy and when you are finished you may have just learned something. I think you should read this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Mind Expanding - inspiring!
Review: This book opened me up to awarenesses that I always suspected were there but didn't know how to get to. I find this world to be filled with cynicism, fear and anger, but the truth of Lenz's writing encourages someone such as myself, a lone-wolf seeker, to tread on, fearlessly, with a smile. I feel sorry for those who have disparaged the writing. They are obviously afraid of enlightenment, afraid of light, afraid of truth.
Rating:
Summary: Crap
Review: This national bestseller is written in a flowing, easygoing style and uses readily accessible imagery. Unfortunately, it also throws a bunch of New Age terms out and, although the author does attempt to make some sense of it, more often it just comes out as a jumble of crap. While reading this book, I felt like I was reading a cross between The Way of the Peaceful Warrior, which I found entertaining and insightful, and The Celestine Prophecy, which I found absolutely detestable. There are a lot of valid ideas in this book, most of which I've read in greater detail and better description elsewhere, and then there's crap like this: "...Master Fwap told me that most people who have been enlightened in their previous incarnations would normally begin to regain their past-life enlightenment-if they lived at sea level-at around the age of twenty-nine, when their astrological Saturn return took place. He said that living in or near sacred mountains, because of their beneficial auric influences, often made past-life returns happen even faster." What?! Sea level? Saturn return? Auric influences? I'm not close-minded, but Lenz makes little attempt to make believers out of non-believers, he throws out jargon like this with impunity. The quote on the cover by Laurie Anderson says, "A wild ride through the basics of Buddhism." Yet I don't think Buddhism has much to do with Western astrology, Atlantis, and lines of energy. Furthermore, Lenz doesn't even mention the fundamental Buddhist precepts, the Four Noble Truths. When he does describe Buddhist concepts, I feel more comfortable because I understand, because it makes logical and philosophical sense. It's when he goes off on a wild tangent about how Atlantis sensed the pollution of the world's aura or something like that that I feel inclined to dismiss this book as nothing more than a piece of New Age fluff.
Rating:
Summary: This is not your Mother's Buddhism
Review: If you're looking for a book about the eight fold path or the four noble truths this is not your book. This is about Buddhism as it really is, ever-changing, growing, evolving; always cutting-edge, never what you think it should be. There are people who study Buddhism, and there are people who live Buddhism. Surfing the Himalayas is the story (mostly true) of one such person. It reveals one of the greatest secrets of the universe: Enlightenment does exist... and, it has a sense of humor.
Rating: 
Summary: Frederick Lenz, notorious cult leader
Review: Frederick Lenz during his lifetime was a notorious cult leader that secretly victimized hundreds of followers for money, sex, and power, effectively hiding the intents of his purpose under the guise of spiritualism and pursuits of enlightenment. Many of his victims were taught incorrect spritual principles, lived in poverty while Frederick Lenz lived in extravagant luxury, and gave most of their youth, lives, health and energy, and more specifically money to Frederick Lenz. Frederick Lenz deserves his bad reputation within the spiritual community for the harm he brought to his followers, many of them who were innocent youth and who were innocent to spiritual charlatanism and exploitation. His suicide/death is a fitting retribution of those who are false teachers and cause violence against their students. This book is only a propaganda piece for his own elevation as a teacher, whose only legacy is intense damage.
Rating:
Summary: Lenz is a FLAKE
Review: Frederick Lenz claims to be a "world-class" snowboarder. His choice of rhetoric does not escape the fact that he is as "AM" (not "Pro")as they come. Anyone who has ridden on a different hemisphere can consider themselves a "world-class" snowboarder; thus, my 65 year old Grandmother is a "world-class" snowboarder...just like Mr. Lenz. Lenz is a discrace to the "true" snowboarder community. He writes for middle-class "week-end worriors" who snowboard because they think it will impress their kids. Moreover, Lenz makes more money then any and all top pro riders (even Terje), so don't be fooled by his so-hip-Cali-pour-boy front; he's a million-dollar-poster-boy who will sell-out at a moments notice. Ask anyone who can land a backside rodeo 540 who "Frederick Lenz" is...and they'll have no clue. Why! Because he's a no-body; he's not a snowboarder; he's a flake!
Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your time or money
Review: This book doesn't succeed on any level. As an introduction to Buddhism, it has so much hocus pocus to it that only someone who already knew a little about the subject could wade through all the extraneous bs.Atlantis?? Give me a break!! For an introduction to Buddhism and/or meditation, try The Accidental Buddhist by Dinty Moore or Awakening the Buddha Within by Lama Surya Das. As fiction, it rates right up there with another example of spiritual drivel, The Celestine Prophecy. Buddhism in its purest form is one of the simplest, most logical spiritual paths one could follow, and this author bastardizes it into something almost unreckognizable. Do not waste your time.
Rating:
Summary: entertaining, fun
Review: I know I need to reread it. By the time I got to "relational thinking"-- I knew I was swimming in deep waters. Silly enough to just enjoy the ride. Solid enough to return to again and again.
Rating:
Summary: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintainence Lite
Review: It was a good read, some parts are obviously made up, such as the levitation, but it has some real truisms that make it worth reading. The narrator gets pretty annoying, what with his constant whining and doubt, and the reading is pretty simple, but it has some real truth to it. A good example is where Master Fwap says, "There is no sin. Only ignorance." Of course, this is the same guy who says, "Interdimensional travelling has nothing to do with enlightenment," but it is nevertheless a pretty good philosophy.
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