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Smile UK Store - Cityboy: Beer and Loathing in the Square Mile
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List Price: £17.99
Our Price: £10.19
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
Manufacturer: Headline
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Hardcover
EAN: 9780755346165
ISBN: 0755346165
Label: Headline
Manufacturer: Headline
Number Of Pages: 320
Publication Date: 2008-06-26
Publisher: Headline
Release Date: 2008-06-20
Studio: Headline
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Editorial Reviews:
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'Who is Cityboy? He’s every brash, suited, FT-carrying idiot who ever pushed past you on the tube. He’s the egotistical buffoon who loudly brags about how much cash he’s made on the market at otherwise pleasant dinner parties. He’s the greedy, ruthless wanker whose actions are helping turn this world into the shit-hole it’s rapidly becoming. For one period in my life, he was me.' In this no-holds-barred, warts-and-all account of life in London’s financial heartland, Cityboy breaks the Square Mile’s code of silence in his own inimitable style, revealing explosive secrets, tricks of the trade and the corrupt, murky underbelly at the heart of life in the City. Drawing on his experience as a young analyst in a major investment bank, the six-figure bonuses, monstrous egos, and the everyday culture of verbal and substance abuse that fuels the world’s money markets is brutally exposed as Cityboy describes his ascent up the hierarchy of this intensely competitive and morally dubious industry, and how it almost cost him his sanity.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: junk
Comment: As one other reviewer said: could have been written by anyone who kept a diary. I have lost interest after 3 chapters ( the trading floor had traders AND Market makers ????)
Save your money and buy liars poker instead.
Customer Rating:
Summary: City worker, beware....
Comment: What I find rather hilarious is that 90% of the negative reviews written about this book are written by past and present city workers who are obviously furious at the brutal, honest and hilarious portrayal of the average city 'fat cats' that Geraint has achieved so immaculately.
I would tell anyone else to not be swayed by these negative reviews - the book is truly unique and will make you laugh until it hurts. Its definately one on the funniest things I have read in a long time, and I salute Geraint for taking the courage to walk away from it all and expose the b******s for what they really are.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Interesting but not really that clever
Comment: Upon opening the book I was disappointed to read the disclaimer that it was purely a work of fiction based on his city experience. I was expecting a whistle blower's account but instead got a jaded hippy's story of what life might have been like.
Throughout the book I find myself taking a dislike to the greedy, selfish, drug addicted, hypocrite that is Steve the would-be anti-hero. The book isn't well written either with frequent bad language and crude saying taking the place of good sentences.
Disappointment and dislike aside I made it through the whole book and found the author's discussion on stock market crashes and bubbles over the last decade particularly interesting and insightful. For this reason the book is worth a read and I give it an honest 3/5.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Bloody Brilliant
Comment: I couldn't care less if this book is about fact or fiction. All I know is that I bought it at the airport and red 150 pages while waiting in the departure lounge. Another 100 pages on the plane, and a final 53 pages before going to sleep. Any book that keeps me reading has got to be worth a look.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Should be called 'City ego' - Geraint Anderson's autobiography
Comment: The inlay to this book tells us the author 'breaks the Square Mile's code of silence to reveal explosive secrets about what life is really like' but all I really discovered here was how big an ego one cityboy (like hundreds of others) can have.
The essence of the book is basically :
1. His brother got him a job in the city
2. He snorted cocaine
3. He lied his way from job to job, in the process gaining ludicrous bonuses and pay increases
4. How his main aim for 6 years was to outdo a fellow analyst, betting a £100k on it
5. Then at the end stick in some paragraphs about world peace and how the city is a place of greed and backstabbing (as if we did not know !)
I found nothing really new in the book having worked in the city for 13 years. Many people could have written this story. (if you keep a diary and are a city analyst/trader you may as well submit it to the publisher !).
The author gives us his life story of his time in the city over 300 pages but tends to give us history lessons (events in Corporate America and Black Monday) which have no correlation to the flow of the book.
Geraint Anderson is a classic story of working the system to his benefit, having fun on the way, sacrificing those around him and then leaving the city as he 'felt uncomfortable' with it, despite having earnt a fortune from it. Smells of double standards to me.
This is more for the airport folks who want to sit on a beach and not have to read anything in depth. A simple read which as mentioned has not really revealed any secrets at all.
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