I am amazed by the positive feedback for this book. It may be somewhat creative, but the ‘moral of the story’ is quite lousy. In the story, all adults of the town are extremely lazy, but because they are unintelligent, they all believe that they are successful because they are hard workers. It is revealed to readers that their good fortune is actually caused by totally random events that the adults are not smart enough to understand.

One day, one family in the town falls on hard times. Because all adults fail to recognize that their success is a result of luck rather than hard work, they all refuse to help out. As a result of this, they all fall on hard times.

The moral of the story is not about compassionate sharing, although that would have been nice. The moral is about successful people oweing help to the less fortunate because their success was a random event that was not earned or deserved. A rather negative outlook on life that does not speak highly of the author’s own virtues.

I suppose that if you dislike taking responsibility for your actions and you hope your children will do the same, this book provides a useful perspective. For those who want to raise their children otherwise, I would suggest avoiding this book.