This was a short little book on creativity. An incredibly fast read, with anecdotes and advice sprinkled among many of MacLeod's business card cartoons, for which he's known.

I can't say I got much out of the book, unfortunately. A lot of the content seems stale, rehashed, and even preachy at times. MacLeod has a very black-and-white view of how to do creativity "right". For example, he's adamant you shouldn't quit your day job while you pursue your passion, and that sitting home alone creating art would be a nightmare. So his basic premise is that if you follow the creative path exactly as he did it, then good on you. If not, you'll likely end up a drug addict, an alcoholic, or broke and delusional on your death bed.

I wholeheartedly recommend taking MacLeod's book with a giant grain of salt. It's simply one person's experience of living a creative life, packaged as gospel. His biased preaching may resonate with you, but if it doesn't, rest assured, you're not alone. ( )

' "Your book has thirteen chapters,” I say. “Voilà! That’s thirteen blog posts. One chapter per blog post. Put it online, and you’ll have a book offer within six months. Trust me.” '

That quote pretty much sums up this book, except it's 40 blog posts, instead of 13.

In theory, I'm not opposed to the blog-post-listicle book, this one just didn't do it for me. Too many "I-stories" (where the pronoun "I" is used far too often), combined with obvious observations phrased as wisdom, and it just felt bland. A few of the forty were OK, but not enough to make it hit with me. ( )

Good and kind of harsh advices on finding your way into a successful art / business life. ( )

I was pretty disappointed with this book. MacLeod doesn't actually build an argument in this book, but instead seems to repeat the same points in each chapter. The observations he makes, while contradictory, seem a little obvious to me, but I may not be his intended audience, and there is something to be said for reminding people of the obvious truths that the daily grind has made them forget.

Don't get me wrong, MacLeod is not wrong, far from it. It's just the book does not do a very good job of supporting his argument in a compelling way. I hate to say this, but I wish I had taken a look at it in the bookstore before downloading it to my Kindle (the sample chapters for this book in the Kindle store was just the Table of Contents). Had I taken a closer look before hand, I probably wouldn't have spent the $10 on it. ( )

Interesting and cleverly useful bits of creative advise. ( )

Interesting and cleverly useful bits of creative advise. ( )

Unlike Jellyn, I got more from MacLeod's book than from 'Steal Like an Artist'. Just goes to show, each to his own. This small tome - easily read in a couple of hours, shares encourgaing thoughts that are obviously based on personal experience. Good humoured too, with a couple of the cartoons prompting out-loud belly laughs. Thoroughly enjoyable - and inspiring - read. ( )

I didn't hate this book....but I didn't love it either.

Yes, he had some pretty good points. Heck, at times he had some really great points! But what was more difficult for me to get past was the fact that every other sentence was about how he drew on the back of business cards. I get it. Can we move on?

If you're looking for an easy sunday afternoon read, pick it up. It's decent and certainly easy to get through. If you're looking for life changing though, maybe try something else. ( )

Not a bad little book. I feel like I got more out of Steal Like an Artist, but I did take a page worth of notes, so there's some new things or new ways of phrasing things in here that I thought were noteworthy. ( )

This is the book I needed, it reconnected me to the messages about creativity I've been receiving. And as I step out in my life as photographer, I need to be reminded what it's all about.

MacLeod does not sugar coat what it means to be a creative person and the prices we all pay for that, as well as the rewards. There's nothing surprising in MacLeod's lessons, and they are welcome reminders. ( )

Think of this as a daily affirmation – Hugh MacLeod providing quick thoughts and insights to help drive you to be just a little bit more creative (and just a little bit scared about that creativity).

Back it up a second: Who is Hugh MacCleod? Well, he is an ad guy who found an interesting niche. Years ago he started writing little cartoons and sayings on the back of business cards. What started out as a bar trick has translated into his own business. Now, when I say cartoons, that really doesn't speak to what these little snippets of and thoughts about life really do. Many contain a wallop. And it is definitely in the category of "you have to see them to know what I'm talking about."

I have been a follower of Hugh's daily emails for a couple of years. I've never read any of his other books, so I can't speak to you about tribes or any of his other concepts. I can say that more than one of his cartoons have been important to me, and that is why I got this particular book.

Now, if you aren't a fan of Hugh's, I'm not sure this is the book that will convince you. (I'd suggest you go to the web site first and get to know him.) That being said, I don't think you go wrong with this book. As mentioned at the outset, these may well represent the little prods that get you thinking just a little differently about where you are at.

And, for me, starting my own consulting business after 30 years in the real world, it was a nice reminder of the fun and sheer terror that awaits me. ( )

In a way I really enjoyed this book - there is a certain freshness in the unapologetic way the author talks about things that are generally common sense but may not be popular subjects to discuss with the creative crowd, such as that there will be hard times, or that relying on being "discovered" is foolish, or even that you may never make it big at all. He calls out those who waste their lives in meaningless bill-pay jobs while waiting for the big break in whatever their creative outlet is, and those who he dubs Watercoolies: the chronic complainers with stagnant careers.
There are anecdotes from MacLeod's life that illustrate the point of every chapter and there are his business card cartoons that either drive that point home, entertain, or give more food for thought. These make the already short book a fast and easy read that avoids being stuffy or preachy or even overly serious while talking about a subject that's very serious for a lot of people.
With all that said by the time I got to the 40th tip I felt that the book was much too long, that some of the tips were essentially the same and could have been combined without doing the book any harm. I even went through the chapter titles trying to remember which stories went with them and found that a few were interchangeable.
This is a decent read, especially if you want a fresh shot of motivation or to switch gears. It is also a great reminder that not every creative endeavor needs to rival the work of Beethoven, Da Vinci, Rowling or Jobs, it simply has to be yours. ( )

I found this book to be very freeing of my mind and spirit. ( )

I read this book in one sitting and absolutely loved it and would recommend it to anyone that is working in the creative field, which I happen to think is everyone! Hugh MacLeod is a cartoonist that created the popular blog, the “Gaping void.” He tells his own story of working in the advertising world and being a copywriter and having his own creativity slowly suffocated by this environment. His writing in both witty and insightful and he asks the question: "Where does creativity come from?" and talks about how to your nurture your own ideas without having them destroyed by others or your own internal voice that starts comparing your work to the work of others.

Hugh shares how he took ownership of his own work and tells that the desire for success prevented him from just doing the work that he wanted to do. In the end he explains it is about sitting down and doing the work and taking risks and being authentic to yourself and ignoring to some extent, the world around you and those voices.

Hugh points out “The more original your idea is, the less good advice people will be able to give you.”

The book is full of Hugh’s cartoons. I found myself reading, laughing and nodding my head from the first page to the last. While the book will not teach you how to be creative, it has a good chance of inspiring you.

My recommendation is to read the book, then put it down and get back to creating something wonderful. ( )

Some interesting ideas, but more really obvious ones (e.g. "work hard"). A book is a whole package, design and layout, and the text layout was distracting too. ( )

A small book with big ideas. Hugh MacLeod's life changed utterly when he followed his muse and merely began drawing pictures on the back of business cards. Now he is one of the most highly regarded creatives on the web. In Ignore Everybody, he explains his philosophy, Mr. Rogers style. [ full review ] ( )

Totally invigorating and spot on!!! Loved it, want to hand it around to friends.

It's like a hip, funny, zen and ultra-condensed version of Rollo May's "The Courage to Create". With pictures!

I especially loved his concept of "sovereignty" over your art / creative pursuit. ( )

Low page count, big type, broad spaces between the lines, and lots of cartoons. As MacLeod cheerfully admits in the beginning, this is more of an extended blog post than a book, so there's not much sense in buying it when you can finish the thing in about half and hour while sitting in the Barnes and Noble cafe.

Ignore Everybody is a lively self-help pep talk for people who want to achieve some kind of success in a creative field. MacLeod was an artist in New York who paid the bills by working in an advertising agency, and from this archetypal vantage point he managed to collect a few gems of good advice: do your own work diligently, don't care what other people think about you, don't waste your energy worrying about selling out. Basically, don't buy into the whole adolescent idea of the romantic artist who wows naysayers with a single burst of effortless genius. It's nothing that hasn't been said before, but since there are new eighteen year-olds coming on line all the time it can't hurt to have it said again.

The one novel detail in Ignore Everybody is MacLeod's cartoons. These are sarcastic line-drawing doodles originally done on the backs of business cards about how hard it is to make art and/or get laid in New York City. Throughout the book MacLeod comes back to his business card cartoons as a case study of how to make it in the art world. The fact that they were done spontaneously, for his own amusement, with no thought of pleasing anyone else or achieving commercial success is the reason why they became so successful and he became famous as the back-of-the-business-card guy. The what? The hunh? The book seems to take for granted that we've all heard of the back-of-the-business-card guy and are curious to hear how he made it so big. So add to MacLeod's list another useful piece of advice for aspiring creative types: always overestimate your own importance. ( )