The Monk and the Riddle

The Art of Creating a Life While Making a Living

By: Randy Komisar, Kent Lineback

Narrated by: Randy Komisar

What would you be willing to do for the rest of your life? It's a question most of us consider only hypothetically - opting instead to "do what we have to do" to earn a living. But in the critically acclaimed best seller The Monk and the Riddle, entrepreneurial sage Randy Komisar asks us to answer it for real.

©2000, 2001 Randy Komisar (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers

A truly fantastic resource for dreamers in business

I absolutely loved this book! I found it to be inspirational, with so much wisdom about human nature. And at the same time, Mr. Komisar digs deep into the trenches of Silicon Valley from the late 1970s until around the year 2000.

His wide ranging experience as a lawyer, CEO and business advisor, and the case studies he reveals are presented in a way that made me feel as though I was sitting with him and others in the coffee shop that served as the setting for so many of the book’s passages.

As someone who has lived, studied and traveled around Europe and Asia, I also loved hearing some of the author’s travel stories.

A wonderful story, with a great meaning

It took me until the very end and a few days after of thinking back to truly appreceate this book. It is now foundational to me and will forever affect my life in some way.

Thank you.

A Subtle and Elegant Lesson in Life

Amazing read! At first I was unimpressed, expecting the usual rapid fire of helpful life lesson inspirational factoids. But much like the anecdote at the start of the book, what seems like an arduous road to travel becomes itself an exciting adventure the further you go. Buried deep in the weaving tale of the author's life are lesson about living life fullest as well as surviving in a corporate world. Beautiful!

My absolutely only criticism is that the reading is a bit low. It was impossible to listen even atax volume in most places, and even with headphones I had to crank the volume. Nothing ten or twenty minutes ayong with audio levels can't fix.

just do it

fantastic read. randy is a fantastic story teller, entrepreneur and venture capitalist. just do it

Good stories

Overall this was a good book. I just wish it drew more conclusions. Who was the “monk” and what was the “riddle”?

Had high hopes

I saw a quote from this book and was eager to understand the riddle about how to live a creative life while earning a living. Instead, Randy, who is obviously a very talented yet entitled man, tells a rather boring and predictable story about Lenny who is not too sharp but determined to play the VC game Randy was born into. Randy prides himself on being cool, riding a motorcycle, drinking coffee at all the happening spots, and he’s very well traveled. Eventually, he gets Kenny to see the error of his ways and start a business that is not completely terrible. This was a self-righteous memoir, not so much a motivational or how-to book. Good for Randy for living a very privileged life and working with so many elite people while remaining a vegetarian, traveler, and bike rider - I felt like he wrote this because he needed to hear that. Also, how much does a “Virtual CEO” make? Asking for the folks who didn’t go to elite East Coast schools or get lucky in Silicon Valley back in the 90s.

Some great thoughts, poorly written

I found the content of the book extremely useful, especially since it’s a part of my MBA entrepreneurship course. Lots of insight first hand as well as wisdom shared by the author. But it’s pretty poorly written, I had to switch to an audio version to save some time and skip self-promotion segments and useless chapters that have nothing to do with the main storyline.