12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos- Book Review

12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Jordan B. Peterson

Genre: Non-Fiction, Self-help

3.3 Stars 

Disclaimer: I am not the target audience for the book. I’ve read it because it was sent to me by the review club. I’ve never been a fan of self-help books, and my opinion remains unchanged. 

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12 Rules for Life offers just what it claims in the title and much more. The author is a professor of psychology and a clinical psychologist. He mentions how the idea of writing the book (by compiling his answers on Quora) came when a literary agent suggested it. 

The book is more than 400 pages long with 200+ footnotes and not to mention a bundle of references at the end. The author deals with each rule in detail. There are frequent references to Bible, religion, and at times, other religions. 

He also talks about animals, evolution, human nature (obviously!), and situations from his life. I liked the dry humor in bits and pieces, though the overall tone (that’s exclusive to self-help books) bored me quite a bit. 

The rules I liked were the ones that deal with friends and kids. He uses his personal and professional experiences to explain, and that made them interesting. My personal opinions aside, I liked how he put across his ideas for these. 

The other two that caught my attention were about listening, being precise in speech (irony, I know), and not bothering kids when they are skateboarding. 

I did skim through some reviews on Goodreads when I received the book and saw that a few readers were triggered. Halfway through the book, I could see why. If only he emphasized more on it without leaning on Bible and the Testaments! It’s almost as if the first half and second half of the book don’t match. 

Maybe the book could have been made into three books- 

one to talk about the rules for life in a precise manner, 

one to compare religion and life at large, 

and the last book to analyze communism, socialism, and of course, trigger some of the crowd. 

Wouldn’t that have been a treat to read? Each book could be picked up by the respective target audience. 

I got pretty bored of the first half and would have DNF’d the book if it wasn’t a mandatory read. The second half is almost redeeming. But still, I’d rather read the next half directly without going through all of the previous stuff. 

Two quotes I loved from the book-

“Don’t hide baby monsters under the carpet.” 

“Because too agreeable people bend over backwards for other people, they do not stand up properly for themselves.”

He goes on to say how this attitude makes them resent others and the world at large for not understanding them and their sacrifices. Makes sense to me, more so because I’ve seen such people in real life. They drain your energy real quick! 

To sum up, I enjoyed the book better than what I expected when I started it. The book did give me a few points to think about, so that’s something for sure. The rating went from 2 to 3.3 stars for the same reason. 

People frowning and smirking at my review (rant) are likely to enjoy the book a lot more. Don’t listen to me to make your decision (as you would have already summarized). Go ahead and give it a shot. You might love it. Who knows! 

I received a review copy from Indic Academy and Indic Book Club. This review is posted as a part of the Thousand Reviewers Club. 

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P.S: Can Penguin please use a larger print next time to save readers’ eyes?