Reviews

How to Speak Money: What the Money People Say — And What It Really Means by John Lanchester

tsharris's review against another edition

4.0

Something of a "devil's dictionary" for modern economics and finance, although the proportion of substance to sarcasm is skewed considerably towards the former rather than the latter. Lanchester is a learned non-specialist who clearly has undertaken considerable study and is an able explainer of key terms and concepts. This book is not without the occasional error, but his explanations are clear, concise, and will be worth revisiting.

eowyns_helmet's review against another edition

5.0

If, like me, you both loathe talking about money and high finance -- and are terrified by it -- this is the book for you. In clear, often funny and always insightful ways, writer John Lanchester exposes some of the "bullshit" -- and a lot of the "nonsense" (read the book for the difference) -- in modern finance. Some terms I thought I understood but didn't (hedge find). Others, I didn't understand, but am newly terrified by. Hollowing out is one. "Hollowing out" is when jobs disappear from an economy while from the outside things look the same, except for the fact that families that once depended on these jobs are devastated. Other terms are surprisingly beautiful, like La ricchezza e una ragione: richness is a relationship between two people. Both his forward and afterword are must-reads, as he both parses where we've come from and, ominously, where we're going, especially in terms of the increasing gap between haves (and haves way to much) and have-nots. Spoiler: the gap will gets much, much worse.

biancs's review against another edition

4.0

I wanted to learn more about finance so I checked out this audiobook from libby. I know a few more things about finance terminology than I did last week, so it was effective to that end. The writing was digestible and occasionally funny. The best part about this book is that it is a miracle sleep aid: this is not an indictment on its quality, simply an observation. The audiobook narrator has a soothing voice and I am not the sort of person who can stay awake through a glossary of financial terms. Highly recommend if you have sleep problems or are deeply interested in a comprehensive overview of money jargon.

miguelf's review

3.0

This starts off quite good, but then becomes an alphabetical list of financial terms and their meaning for 80% of the book. It makes for a lackluster read / listen, unless one enjoys reading dictionaries. It's clear based on the introductory chapters that the author had a great book in them to deliver on the topic, but wasn't quite what I was expecting or wanting.

eush's review against another edition

4.0

For someone like me who knows nothing about economics, this book is a good primer. There's also a 'further reading' section if you want to get more in depth about money and economics, and I've already added them to my reading list.

Now I gotta finish Debt, which I started in 2013 and still haven't finished

melhara's review

3.0

This month, I am challenging myself to read/listen to more personal finance books! YAY!



I’ve been out of school and working full-time for over a year now (#adulting, yay again!) and am looking into buying my own place (preferably an apartment but a house would be nice too). Unfortunately for me, I don’t know much about finance. Or saving up for retirement now that I’m working...

Hence my sudden impulse to download every personal finance book I can find on OverDrive.

I’m not sure if listening [b: How to Speak Money|18377995|How to Speak Money What the Money People Say — And What It Really Means|John Lanchester|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1413752586s/18377995.jpg|25993843] was the best idea. Don’t get me wrong, this was a surprisingly good book with a lot of very helpful explanations. I will definitely want a hardcopy version of this book to read and refer to. The reason why I’m only giving the audiobook version of this book three stars is because it’s kind of like listening to someone reading the dictionary (albeit a relatively fun dictionary). I suppose it’s kind of implied in the title of the book…

[b: How to Speak Money|18377995|How to Speak Money What the Money People Say — And What It Really Means|John Lanchester|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1413752586s/18377995.jpg|25993843] is essentially a lexicon of financial terminologies (but with fun and understandable examples). It’s great for someone (like myself) who knows next to nothing about money.

anniegroover's review against another edition

4.0

This is a great generalist overview of money/finance/economics. It's a great guide to getting the vocabulary down in order to understand generally what's going on in the world, financially speaking anyway. Plus he's hilarious, so it's enjoyable as well.

adamantium's review against another edition

4.0

Informative, clear, snarky.

bookish_sue's review against another edition

3.0

Solid information liberally peppered with humor/sarcasm. A reader lacking a basic understanding of financial issues may be misinformed by this humor/sarcasm.

Also: am I the only one who wishes books written by Brits were left in British English rather than "translated" into American English? This book suffers a few awkward passages due to language/cultural translation.

Also also: read this book and be depressed about the marked lack of citations from female economic thinkers and also a gender bias in the language of author examples (of the sort: "when a banker signs a deal he...").

clapton's review against another edition

4.0

For a book that's largely made of providing definition of terms in finance and economics which are easily found on investopedia this book is better than it has any right to be. It ends with an essay about how he thinks political economy may change in the next decade. It was written in 2014 but still has it's resonances largely because there has been little change to structural problems