Book Review: Lost and Found {Geneen Roth}

As Geneen Roth noted in her latest book, Lost and Found, James Grant once said, “Insofar as there is a lesson in history, it’s that human beings are not good with large sums of money, anything over $136.”

And ain’t that the truth?  Just reference any “Lottery Winners Go Bankrupt” story that People magazine has run over their publication history.  Or MC Hammer’s story after his U Can’t Touch This fame.

This newest book from the NY Times best-selling author goes into how she and her husband lost money with Bernie Madoff, to the tune of nearly a million dollars.  But beyond any “woe is me” tale, it’s a candid, introspective and realistic look into her own personal relationship with money.

Not a self-help book, and not a tips-for-financial-success tome, rather, it’s a call to examine our own relationship with money, how spending is sometimes to fill a void or deficit in other areas of life, how and why we spend what we do, and how it can’t possibly fix holes without other work being done first.  Given Roth’s own issues with food, it’s not that much of a leap.

The book is a quick read, albeit a much heavier topic than your average bring-to-the-beach title, and doesn’t pull any punches in terms of revealing personal details of Roth’s own financial troubles (both before the Madoff debacle, during, and after).  That said, don’t read this book expecting a panacea for your own financial woes or answers to your questions.  It is one woman’s story of money lost, hope gained, and the journey she took along the way, and she tells it (along with her other books on relationships with food, and the workshops she teaches) merely in an attempt to help others.

Have you read this book already?  Then come over and join the discussion already underway over at BlogHer.

Hungry for more book reviews?
A Bad Case of Stripes
Fault in Our Stars
Diary of a Mad Fat Girl
The Rules of Inheritance
The Weird Sisters

This was a paid review for BlogHer Book Club but the opinions expressed are my own.

Print it!