Book Review: Emergency by Neil Strauss

I thought we would do book reviews occasionally (and I mean rare occasions) here on Black Scout. This by far has to be one of my favorite books (I read it in just three days). Although it has been out for sometime (2009), I just recently read it a few months back. The book was written by Neil Strauss, best known for his book The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artist.

Neil Strauss is not your typical "survivalist" and this fact alone is what makes this book interesting. Even though the cover states "this book will save your life"- it is not a survival manual per-say. However their are some survival/urban evasion techniques listed in the book.  It's more about Neil's journey into becoming more prepared and learning the skills that may help if the world does go to crap. The book spans three years where Neil learns from various outlets covering urban survival, lock-picking, wilderness survival (while attending Tom Brown Tracker School), weapons training, buying tons of cool gear, and becoming an EMT to name a few. He also becomes a citizen of St. Kitts and gives some idea for those of you that may want to get dual citizenship. Also tells you where to skip across the Mexican border undetected. 


I really liked his approach to becoming more self-reliant. He made very calculated decisions on training and preparedness. Although I would guess it cost him a ton of money to receive all this training. Where most "preppers" buy a ton of food and guns and assume they are prepared. Understanding that survival is so much more than storage, its more importantly a development of skills.

Overall this book will help you re-evaluate your gear and your skill sets. It may even open up some new outlets for you guys to examine. Even though I said its not a "survival manual" you will learn some stuff (survival manuals are boring anyways).

If you like what we do here on Black Scout you will definitely enjoy this book. Just click the Amazon link below if you would like to buy the book.



No comments:

Post a Comment