The usual excuse of the young is that they don’t have enough experience or capital, and older people that they don’t want to jeopardize the career they have built so far or can’t afford to put at risk the security of their families.

After all, if everyone was willing to make the necessary sacrifices, who would be around to work for my own companies?It is for this reason that so many people have become rich despite never having had a single great idea in their lives. Most people who read this book will not believe him when he says that being rich really won't make you happier (though he does admit it will up your chances of having sex. The folly, on the other hand, often takes the shape of a peculiar affliction, known colloquially as the “it wasn’t invented here” syndrome. Ideas are certainly of immense importance, but I have seen so many people attempting to create a start-up company become obsessed with proving that their idea is “right” rather than obsessed with making money. The idea would be worthless, no one would beat a path to any door, unless they heard that the mouse-trap had been made.

This genre of literature is nonfiction business as it shares the advice of a multi millionaire, while at the same time explores the many philosophical incentives of being rich.

First let me declare an interest, I worked for the man, not in the early pioneering years but in the middle years, when he had already amassed considerable wealth.

There are other works similar to Dennis’s How to Get Rich, one of which is How to Get Rich on Purpose, a book by a motivational speaker named DeWayne Owens. Having said all that it is impossible to be too critical as the book is full of gems of extremely astute advice and observation. At the end of the day he does not take wealth, or his mad pursuit it, too seriously, and counsels the reader not to either. Though at some points written in a ‘stream of consciousness’ style, the points made are in fact razor-sharp, and in the tradition of John Paul Getty’s How To Be Rich, his book will be inspiring and educating potential entrepreneurs for years to come.

So while I don't know how valuable this book will be to people who have no entrepreneurial experience, as someone who is two years into the grueling process of running a start-up, I found a lot of useful information in this book. The Narrow Road is as deeply philosophical as How to get Rich, but is more concentrated on the negative aspects of having an abundance of money. Dennis notes that only a tiny percentage of people in his native Britain could be considered really wealthy. Another example is, treating the journey to higher finance as if it's a game and to have fun, while at the same time being obsessed with winning and constantly strategizing. Some of it is practical - such as how he handled the 4 employees who politely threatened to leave his firm and start a competing company if he didn't give them a quarter of his equity, or the rules he requires all board members to adhere to.

These are all challenges that the majority of Dennis’s audience are familiar with, so it is nice that he tells the aspiring entrepreneurs reading his book that they can overcome overwhelming fears, and even use them to their advantage. More importantly as a businessman he is right more often than he is wrong and his timing is very good. Otherwise, just be the man who switches the trains from track to track without having to know what is in the cattle trucks . Not so thick as to blind you to well-constructed criticism and advice, especially from those you trust.One of the tests of a good biographer in my opinion is that when you finish the book you feel like you was one of your best friends, and this book did that for me. The time spent attempting to acquire wealth will mount up and cannot be reclaimed, whether you succeed or whether you fail. But licensing a magazine title is the ultimate surrender of equity -and the passage goes against much of what the author says about surrendering equity. If we were making "profits," asked the "analysts," weren't we in danger of "wasting" money that could have been invested to produce more "growth"?