Name: The Wolf of Wall Street
Rating: 3.611111111111111 (27 reviews)
ISBN: 9780553805468

Jordan Belfort

The former head of the notorious investment firm Stratton Oakmont describes the rise and fall of his financial empire, his life of jet-setting glamour and excess, and the scandal that destroyed his empire, sent him to prison, and led to a near-fatal brush with drug abuse.

The Wolf of Wall Street

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE DIRECTED BY MARTIN SCORSESE, STARRING LEONARDO DICAPRIO (The Great Gatsby, The Aviator),MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY (Mud, Magic Mike), JONAH HILL (Moneyball), JEAN DUJARDIN (The Artist), KYLE CHANDLER (Friday Night Lights, Zero Dark Thirty) AND JOANNA LUMLEY (Absolutely Fabulous), AND ADAPTED FOR THE SCREEN BY TERENCE WINTER (Boardwalk Empire). 'What separates Jordan's story from others like it, is the brutal honesty.' - Leonardo DiCaprio By day he made thousands of dollars a minute. By night he spent it as fast as he could, on drugs, sex, and international globe-trotting. From the binge that sunk a 170-foot motor yacht, crashed a Gulfstream jet, and ran up a $700,000 hotel tab, to the wife and kids who waited for him for at home, and the fast-talking, hard-partying young stockbrokers who called him king and did his bidding, here, in his own inimitable words, is the story of the ill-fated genius they called... THE WOLF OF WALL STREET In the 1990s Jordan Belfort, former kingpin of the notorious investment firm Stratton Oakmont, became one of the most infamous names in American finance: a brilliant, conniving stock-chopper who led his merry mob on a wild ride out of the canyons of Wall Street and into a massive office on Long Island. In this astounding and hilarious tell-all autobiography, Belfort narrates a story of greed, power, and excess no one could invent - the story of an ordinary guy who went from hustling Italian ices at sixteen to making hundreds of millions. Until it all came crashing down.

Briar's Reviews

** spoiler alert **
           The Wolf of Wall Street by Jordan Belfort was an interesting novel that left me completely disinterested.

As someone going into business, this book intrigued me. I also really want to watch the movie, but I wanted to read the book beforehand, so that helped me with picking this read. I thought this book would be over the top exciting, since that's all I've heard about the movie, but alas it was not. This book was probably my most boring read of the year, and that's not an over-exaggeration. 

This book is said to be non-fiction, but Jordan Belfort's opening lines at the beginning of the book also say he may or may not have changed the timelines, which lead me to believe it's not 100% accurate. (But is anything 100% accurate in a memoir? You are relying on memory, which can tell some pretty epic lies...but that's another story). Reading about all the antics within his career was definitely interesting - it's not something I really thought about. All the drugs, alcohol, prostitutes, etc and all the craziness tied in together was definitely the basis of a really cool read. But, this book fell flat. The first "book" (it's separated into books that have chapters in each) was fast paced and epic! I was hooked to every word I read! But Book two and onward left me feeling "meh". It was slow paced, then it would suddenly pick up pace for two pages, and go back to boring again.

That being said, Jordan's life is definitely worth a read - but maybe by a different author? This is Jordan's first book, so with a little more experience and skill this book could have knocked it out of the park. Jordan definitely has talent in writing, it just needs a little more tweaking before he becomes a really great author.

As the narrator, Jordan does come off as that wealthy rich kid stereotype everyone hates. It is sometimes annoying listening to his ranting about how much money he makes, and his hot wife, and how he cheats and does drugs and will absolutely quit but never does. That felt like it was 60% of this book - the same comments being repeated in different ways. "I'll quit..." then he doesn't, "I'll stop!..." then he doesn't, and so on. There's also no remorse for what he does. He is destroying lives, but hey, I'm rich so whatever! That's what I got out of this book. There was no life lessons at the end, no big "Ta Da! I've done well!", it's just him being rich and all of the bad things he does in his life, and the end! His penis, erection and everything about his sex life is mentioned numerous times - and of course, according to him it's god walking on earth. He rarely insults or looks down on himself, but will quickly do it to anybody else. 

Overall, I'm sure Jordan's life was and is interesting, but his story could have been told better. It's almost as if he hasn't learned anything in his life, or at least that's how it's portrayed. And, better yet, there's another book in this series if you want to continue reading because HE DOESN'T FINISH HIS STORY IN THIS BOOK.

2 out of five stars.
Why? It had so much potential, and was so great in the beginning, but tumbled far down about one quarter into the book.

Stian H. N.

Very entertaining book. You'll only wonder how much is fiction and how much is the truth.

Christian Bager Bach Houmann

Alistair James

A candid memoir of greed, power, and hedonism journeys inside the high-stakes world of finance as the former head of the notorious investment firm Stratton Oakmont describes the rise and fall of his financial empire, his life of jet-setting glamour and excess, and the scandal that destroyed his empire, sent him to prison, and led to a near-fatal brush with drug abuse. Reprint. 30,000 first printing.

The Wolf of Wall Street

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