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1. Successful sociopath
   A week ago, I attended a bookstore event entitled “Thiel’s Pursuit of Power,” an interview of Max Chafkin by fellow Bloomberg reporter Emily Chang. One of the last questions she asked was about Peter Thiel’s propensity to exact revenge on anyone who opposes him. Was Max worried?”Well, I am not selling any sex tapes,” he said, an allusion to Thiel’s destruction of Gawker via Hulk Hogan. Nervous laughter ensued.The one-star reviews here have Peter Thiel’s fingerprints all over them, especially the 3,500 word diatribe that had hundreds of likes within a day of the book’s release. (I suspect he wrote it; if he didn’t, he provided most of the content.) I hope it doesn’t get any worse than one-star reviews for Max Chafkin, as he’s written a fascinating tale of a diabolical plotter who’s achieved inordinate success — partly because he has few scruples and seems to care about no one other than Peter Thiel.As a resident of the local area, I could not have been happier to hear that Palantir was leaving for Colorado. For years, the Palantir minions had dominated downtown Palo Alto, driving out dozens of businesses in their insatiable need for additional office space, the glassy-eyed millennials roaming the sidewalks. Were they spying on us? They didn’t even seem to see us. It’s entirely amusing that Palantir’s farewell statement to Silicon Valley made snarky comments about Google and Facebook spying on people and selling their information. Sure they do, but they also offer other services. Palantir is only about spying, and its presence here made many residents uncomfortable.So I was fascinated to read that Palantir had been something of a bust — its software didn’t work that well — and if not for the small investment that Thiel made in a former president’s campaign, one that brought in billions of dollars in contracts, the company might not have survived. Similarly, PayPal had been a poorly-run enterprise under Thiel: the more customers it acquired, the more money it lost. Who knew? Meanwhile, Thiel has socked away billions of untaxable dollars thanks to major loopholes in the Roth IRA — loopholes that most of us could never exploit — and bought citizenship in New Zealand, a favorite doomsteader haven.My favorite part of the book describes Thiel’s efforts to exert influence over the 45th president after backing his candidacy. In this situation, Thiel was out-manipulated, and by that point of the book, I was ready to root for anyone who managed to get the better of him. Thiel’s style is domination through fear, and the former guy simply wasn’t afraid.The Contrarian is far from perfect: it could have used better editing. At least twice, the author repeats the same story in a slightly different way. There are a few inaccuracies — the school’s legal name is in fact Leland Stanford Junior University (rarely used day-to-day, probably because the school got tired of explaining that it was not a “junior university”). Names are misspelled. That was offputting at times, but not enough to detract from the tales that made this book a riveting read.

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2. A rare sneak peak of a complex Silicon Valley giant (psst – ignore the liberal critical tone)
   The negative reviews, the one-stars, etc. are not surprising, esp if they came from Thiel fans or conservatives. I read through this (kindle) book by going thru a few phases:- narrative (first 2 chap)- resentment of the tone (Chap 3-5)- acceptance (6-8)- appreciation (9-10)This is why I think the book deserves 4 stars because it tells the stories of a very complex figure. The world is not black and white. I can’t accept the tone in the book that describes him as the dark lord behind every sinister issue of American politics, but I can see why those events have roots in certain demographics, and maybe appreciate their logic.From the book, you can appreciate that Peter Thiel is a man of thoughts – he has principles – which you may not embrace all of them, but it is thousands of them who make this country great and move forward because things he achieved and invested and supported and failed, etc.Reading this book with an openmind, you will respect Thiel more and build a diff perspective of Silicon Valley and the business world of tomorrow. Buy and read!

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3. Scary and well-told story
   I only ever heard of Peter Theil as a sort of right wing odd duck. He is so much more and scarier than that.This book is the story not only of an unprincipled and powerful man. It’s also kind of a tour through Silicon Valley of the time. I’m well versed in the origin stories of HP and Apple, but nothing I knew before prepared me for this.Great book. Very well written.

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4. Where is Walter Isaacson When You Need Him
   I went into this book wanting to like it. Peter Thiel is nothing if not an extraordinarily complex figure, worth trying to understand—especially given the amount of influence (which Chafkin does a fairly convincing job convincing us of) that he seems to have. The writing is fine, the storytelling works; unfortunately, this book reads like a compilation of 10 years worth of gossip columns and pop psychology.Chafkin did a lot of research, but it appears he had almost no access to Thiel or anyone close to him—and I suspect that’s because he wanted to make this book political, rather than actually try to understand his subject. By the end of the book, I was left feeling entirely unsatisfied that I understood the main character. I felt like I learned much more about Chafkin than about Thiel himself.To address some of the main points in the book: there is one paragraph dedicated to one of Thiel’s most important intellectual influences, René Girard. This is a baffling choice. If you don’t understand the concept of mimetic desire and rivalry, you’ll have a hard time making sense of Thiel and some of the things he does and says. The author seems to have brushed this major influence of Thiel’s completely aside. Girard is a serious philosophical thinker; Chafkin glosses right over him. He opted to focus on anything he considered some kind of salacious detail rather than the serious ideas that may have shaped Thiel’s worldview. (Which I’ve spent some time looking into.)The book does make philosophical claims. He quotes one source as saying that Thiel is a “nihilist”, and implies throughout the entire book that Thiel is some sort of Nietschzean nihilist with a will to power—a major philosophical claim that falls flat when you look at some of the basic things that Thiel has said and done over the years (like his insistence that there are objective truths worth discovering). He almost seems like the opposite of a nihilist!This kind of sweeping insinuation is typical of the book, and runs from beginning to end, as does the Palantir thread which runs through the book as some kind of moral tale—reducing this company to some kind of re-appropriation of PayPal technology and Thiel’s sinister schemes. Nothing really adds up.Nor does the seemingly trivial incident of Thiel driving the Rabbit car and talking himself out of a ticket by claiming that he doesn’t believe in speeding laws. First of all, it’s hard to believe that this really happened. It’s an account of more than 30 years ago, and Chafkin relies on some unknown source (he has a lot of unknown sources in the book) that is most likely remembered a funny conversation that the group of guys had after Thiel sped away, off the hook. Second—even if the story was true, and even if Thiel really argued that (which, again, is hard to believe), it’s hard to fault a 20-year-old college kid. It’s the police officer that comes away looking silly in that incident. The whole thing just doesn’t hold up. It should be the first clue that something is wrong, and that any careful reader should be suspicious of the narrative shaping that the author is doing.Yet Chafkin uses this kind of incident to try to draw out some deep, inner, psychological thread in Thiel that he tries very unconvincely (at least to most) to thread through the whole book.There is just so much in this book that is either factual wrong, or—more often—has some kernel of truth, but is stretched to the maximum level of distortion so that it fits the narrative. Honestly, this book was such a hack that I carefully reviewed every single outlet and name that endorsed it because I’ll never trust them again.I think that people genuinely would like to know something about the person of Peter Thiel; what this book provides was a cheap sale, and a marketing campaign that didn’t fit the contents of the book at all. (Another point: I have a serious problem with the way the book was marketed (rigorous research, a ‘biography’, etc.) and what the ultimate product actually was. If you’re going to write a speculative pop psychology about an entrepreneur, then call it what it is; don’t call it a biography, please.I just wish Walter Isaacson had written this book—and I hope he considers it in the future. It’s a story worth knowing. This book tells none of it.

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5. The author obviously hates Peter Thiel. That is OK, but I was interested in learning about Thiel, not about the author’s agenda. I am sorry that I bought the book.

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6. there is certainly a lot to investigate about the main character but the book contains too many pages/words to say what it has to say.so, interesting target but the content is disgressive, repetitive and, finally, boring. waiting for the next book on Peter Thiel, if any.

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7. I have been watching Peter Thiel for some time and very much intrigued by his contradictory and contrarian ideas. And I picked up this book with an expectation to get an account of his life and world view. But much to my disappointment this is nothing more than a hit piece. The author clearly lacks objectivity and wants to get a quick buck bashing Peter Thiel; I’m all for the little guy making money bashing billionaires but have some objectivity for God’s sake. Don’t recommend this book. Save your time and money.

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8. Ignore the organised backlash against this book, as evidence in the numerous, similar 1 star reviews being left.This is in-depth, very good reporting, especially on his early years. Last 3rd part of the book (post-2016) is more well trodden ground and less engaging, but the first 2/3rds is great to understand where Thiel came from and how he became a major force within the tech worlds elite.Whenever a member of the establishment elite gets held to account, there is backlash, which is what has happened against this book, which is another sign of why it’s important reading.

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9. A biased hit job and this becomes clear very early on and becomes a constant refrain.Even one conservative Silicon Valley billionaire is too much for Chafkin to bear

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