Rating: 
Summary: Not for everyone.
Review: Full Contact, no excuses, no applogies. The author describes how he arrived at a level of expertise few of us will ever know.
Rating: 
Summary: Budo or brutality
Review: I found this to be a disheartening book. Although the author's descriptions of the intensity he brings to his training (and fighting) are amazing, most of the book represents, to me, the dark side of the martial arts. Sabat's highest view of spirituality seems to be the degree to which he can endure physical privations, that he never loses a sparring match or fight and that he shows no mercy. Although the samurai, his apparent models, are to be respected for their training and fighting intensity and prowess, they serve as poor models for a citizen of the 20th century. Their ethics never rise higher than "honor," expressed in doing only what is good for me or my "tribe" (family/clan/nation). Spirituality that doesn't ascend past "us vs. them" will only bring us more war and conflict.
Rating:
Summary: This book is about a way of life.
Review: It seems many of these readers miss the message this human Sensei is attempting to document. It is not a story about how great a man Jack Sabat is, nor is it about how much he can suffer and endure. The point I received is that Karate is a way of life, and as with most worthwhile pursuits, great sacrifice, dedication and effort are required to obtain greatness.
Rating:
Summary: This book is about a way of life.
Review: It seems many of these readers miss the message this human Sensei is attempting to document. It is not a story about how great a man Jack Sabat is, nor is it about how much he can suffer and endure. The point I received is that Karate is a way of life, and as with most worthwhile pursuits, great sacrifice, dedication and effort are required to obtain greatness.
Rating: 
Summary: Pure Greatness
Review: It's nice to see a change in the way a martial arts book is written. The harshness allows the reader to feel his pain and his triumphs. I enjoyed this a lot!
Rating:
Summary: like him or not!
Review: Like him or not Sensei Jack Sabet and his top students are THE REAL DEAL. No kata only three years to Shodan here. I was lucky enough to spend the first year of my training (1984) in the Santa Barbara dojo and it set the standard for all my future training. This book is a must read for any Karate student, those who earn thier ranks with no pain, point sparring and kata will probaly not like it but if your old school, hard style you will re-read it five times."Embrace the Pain" Buy it, believe it!
Rating: 
Summary: Oh, please.
Review: Mr. Sabat may indeed be as tough and skilled as he claims, but it appears that physical prowess has not translated into mental prowess. The book's prose is unforgivable, and it forced me to commit the unforgivable sin of the bibliophile: I threw the book in the garbage before my eyes had a chance to bleed.Several reviewers have written about how the book resonated with their own martial arts experiences. Fine. But if one has to make a choice between this masterwork of goofy bloviation or the simpler, more elegant account by Gichin Funakoshi ("Karate-do, My Way of Life"), the prospective reader would be well advised to choose the latter. Funakoshi's accounts of his own prowess are a far cry from the inarticulate chest-beating of Sabat, who could learn a thing or two about the true budo from the sensei's book. The samurai were not brutes; their ethic was well-rounded to include the intellectual and the esthetic. One detects an undercurrent of humility in Funakoshi that seems almost completely absent in Sabat, who would rather concentrate on a bone-crunching, bad-action-movie narrative. Find the book in a bookstore, pick it up, read a few awful paragraphs for yourself, place the book back on the shelf, and then ask yourself why this is to be found in the "Asian Philosophy/Religion" section of the store. Then go pick up something by Alan Watts, Shunryu Suzuki, Thich Nhat Hanh, or Seung Sahn. And if you absolutely must read a westerner on martial arts, try Peter Hyams's modest little tome, "Zen in the Martial Arts." Of course, if you really want to find that obvious-but-elusive Zen, go enroll in a dojo, kwoon, or dojang. A decent one, mind you.
Rating:
Summary: Scary Stuff
Review: The book wasn't what I expected. It is of a very poor prespective on martial arts. I thought, I was in a bar hearing macho beer drinking fight stories and not reading about martial arts. It wasn't a good read, nor informative about martial arts or zen. I don't recommend this book at all. It doesn't properly portray karate or zen at all.
Rating:
Summary: Little Zen and NO Streetfighting
Review: The Japanese word used on the cover of this book is upside down. In visual punning, turning a character upside-down can indicate the opposite meaning is intended. This was probably just an accident done out of ignorance by the graphic artist who designed the cover.
Rating:
Summary: Shameful
Review: This "Street Fighter" only recounts stories of fights in Dojos. Mostly with people who are already intimidated into believing that he can't be beaten. That's half the battle. I'll bet dollars to donuts that if the author ever has the misfortune to be attacked in the street he will be shot or stabbed before he even realizes it is a fight. Vietnam was a vastly more comfortable war on an aircraft carrier. He visited the Phillipines to learn Karate. Obviously Filipinos don't have any worthwhile arts of their own. I won't even start on the childish understanding of Zen. Hint: Satori is not a psychosis. For a genuine look at the mental/spiritual side of Karate try C.W. Nicol's "Moving Zen". The truly regrettable thing is that this person is a teacher, therefore the culture of bad manners and dishonesty toward strangers, has been passed down to another generation, tarnishing the cultural treasure that is budo. Give your ten bucks to charity. There is a lot of bad karma to redeem here.
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