[maxprogram]

You "felt like a sucker" and from another comment "feel like I've been lied to"?

Do other people's comments and criticisms make you change your mind about something that easily? If you thought it was a good book when you read it, why would anything anyone else says change that? (Short of, say, Gladwell made up the entire thing or has been rampantly plagiarizing without attribution.)

Gladwell's books are very well-written narrative combining summarized research studies, anecdotal stories and histories to support his overall thesis. It is not a scientific study. He "connects the dots" of what he believes to be the central theme of his book. I haven't seen anywhere that he "lied".

There will always be detractors to any non-fiction author, especially one so popular. (See Nassim Taleb's books as another example.) If you can find a non-fiction book without major detractors, it probably isn't very good.

[deelowe]

I felt lied to because he cites facts that aren't true, uses questionable sources, and draws conclusions more based on gut feeling and speculation than hard science. He does all this while presenting it as science. The book is sold as non-fiction after all. I got caught up in the hype and naively assumed he must know what he's talking about, but clearly there are issues with his methods.