The Authenticity Hoax: How We Get Lost Finding Ourselves

He does a good job with the basic premise of the book (the search for authenticity is an unproductive one) but he gets side tracked with modernity and consumerism. Ultimately a strong beginning doesn't vindicate this book which has some great insights, but his conclusions are disappointingly shallow and nihilistic.

He advocates a sort of complacent consumerism as an (ultimate?) good and the meaning of life as some willingness to adapt to “progress” or the future. I found his line of thinking, especially in his conclusion nihilistic and rather self-contradictory to the rest of the book. For example, part of his attack on ‘authenticity' is that it is consumer culture run amuck, but that losses all credibility when consumer culture is what's left standing when the smoke clears anyway.

Borrow it from a friend or take it out from the library, the first 3 or 4 chapters are worth the time.