Have you ever bought anything from Zappos? Chances are high. Tony Hsieh was Zappos' visionary. With great highs come great lows, and Tony unfortunately passed due to addiction. The friends-turned-sycophants he surrounded himself with didn't help. In the end, his only true friend was singer Jewel.

Memoirs either suck me in or bore me, and this was the former. I was riveted by this story of success and stupidity. As much good as Tony did for revitalizing downtown Las Vegas, he couldn't do the same in his own life. I don't want to rehash his life story, but know I found it very interesting.

📱 Thank you to NetGalley and Henry Holt and Co.

🎧 Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio

I remember when Zappos first hit the market by storm and reading about it's CEO Tony Hseih was quite interesting. I appreciated the depth in which Hseih's life was explored from early childhood through to his death and his struggle with substance abuse. It is a hard reminder than even when someone appears to have it all, that doesn't mean they can't self destruct.

I thought the book was powerful, well researched and unbiased. Well done!

Thank you Macmillian Audio & NetGalley for this audio ARC.

3.5 stars, rounded up.

To be honest, I mistakenly requested this book thinking it was a memoir, but it’s actually a biography. I don’t typically like biographies because they seem impersonal. While this biography was well-done, it still felt like a biography.

I was pleasantly surprised at how engaging it was from the beginning though. Sometimes biographies can get boring because they often become factual regurgitations of the subject’s life story, or there are unnecessary extended analyses of their life. This book read more like a journal article, rather than a history book, which I appreciated.

Overall, I liked that this gave both the positive and negative perspectives of Tony’s life because memoirs do tend to be more biased and lean one way. You get a well-rounded look into what Tony’s world is like - making it more real.

My main negative for this book is that there wasn’t a whole lot of exploration into more of Tony’s family. You get some surface-level childhood history, but there’s not much else regarding the circumstances around Tony’s brothers and parents as Tony progressed through life. I know the family dynamics were somewhat strained, but I still think more could have been written.

Otherwise, I have no regrets reading this.

This book has a fantastic summary. I had a desire to read nonfiction or a biography & this looked fascinating.

Imagine my surprise to find out that this man’s life in Silicon Valley was a stunning roller coaster ride! If you were to spell his name phonetically it would be: Tony Shaw. Zappo’s founder! I’ve bought shoes & backpacks from there! Who hasn’t!

He lived an unusual life! His management style garnered worldwide attention. He worked at making his employees happy. Every employee wants to hear that said about their employer but he really pulled it off.

This all started in his early 20’s. The book goes back to his childhood to show the scope of his genius. It tells of brothers & even dares to question their motives.

His life was tragically impacted by alcohol & substance abuse. This book left me with so much to think about.

Publication date - 4/25/23.

Thank you MacMillan Audio & NetGalley, this amazing man’s story will sit with me for awhile.