Kirkus Review of Identities

I recently received the Kirkus Review of Identities and I’m happy to share it with you.  It also includes a nice synopsis of the book to give you an idea of what it’s about if you haven’t read it.

There have also been a couple of reviews posted on the Amazon and Book Depository web sites but I’ve gotten a lot of reviews privately via e-mail.  Many people seem to be too shy to put their thoughts out on the web, but if you’ve read the book, do please write a review on the web where you obtain the book.

Here is the Kirkus review:

TITLE INFORMATION

IDENTITIES

Stazyk, T.E.

CreateSpace (366 pp.)

$15.99 paperback, $4.99 e-book

ISBN: 978-1468146851; October 17, 2012

BOOK REVIEW

A management consultant jousts with the loonier aspects of American capitalism in Stazyk’s canny debut satire of the corporate world.

After Dave Locke is booted from the presidency of a technology corporation following a merger, he’s relieved to land a partnership at tony Quantum Consulting. Unfortunately, this avowed bastion of best business practices turns out to be filled with nincompoops. The partners are obsessed with status and extreme-sports exploits; the management committee signs off on Dave’s plans if he sprinkles them with the buzz phrase “world-class”; and clients are given the hard sell on outsourcing and layoffs, no matter what the long-term costs. (Alas, their clients are only too happy to pillage their own firms; one CEO wants to relocate his conglomerate to Panama for tax purposes.)

As a deep recession takes hold, Dave picks his way through a minefield of office politics and callous management theories. Meanwhile, his sons—Alex, a would-be actor who doesn’t want to be defined by his career, and Jim, a workaholic investment banker—debate the spiritual pitfalls of capitalism.

Stazyk’s cutting, funny tale furnishes plenty of Dilbert-esque office gags and colourful characters, including an Indian swami who turns his spiritual aura into a publicly traded corporation. The novel’s greatest creation may be Jim’s girlfriend, Jennifer, a frenzied Wall Streeter whose fussbudget consumerism reflects her hollow soul. Stazyk has written a novel that treats business as an important and absorbing subject; the author knows the terrain well and his naturalistic prose and dialogue has a nuanced subtlety that rings true.

When Dave deploys his infighting skills against boardroom boobs and tyrants, his conviction that business can be both profitable and ethical starts to seem like a believable bottom line.

An entertaining, covertly insightful satire.

I hope you get a chance to read Identities.  Buy a copy for all your friends and your Christmas shopping is finished!  Let me know what you think.

Happy Holidays!