How to Hide: A Practical Guide to Vanishing and Taking Your Assets with You
David Wilkening
Atlantic Publishing Group, Inc.
1405 SW 6th Ave., Ocala, FL 34471-0640
www.atlantic-pub.com
978-1-60138-309-9, $24.95, 2011
Title of review: Not exactly what I thought but still an intriguing read, 3 stars
It’s not often that a book truly grabs me and begs to be read. I find plenty of books that are fascinating but when I came across, “How to Hide: A Practical Guide to Vanishing and Taking Your Assets with You”, my curiosity got the best of me and I just had to read it. While I’d never considered disappearing, I found the premise absolutely intriguing. Even if you are perfectly happy with your life the way it is, I guarantee you’ll take a second glance at this book.
“How to Hide” is essentially a how-to guide for completely leaving your current life behind and going somewhere else to start all over. Author David Wilkening gives plenty of potential reasons some may feel this is their only course of action – divorce, abuse, witnessing a crime and feeling unsafe or vulnerable, etc. From the very beginning, Wilkening takes the responsible route with a number of disclaimers. He notes several times that the steps in the book are not for those looking to commit illegal acts or trying to get out of paying their bills. He further discusses the negative effects a disappearance might have on those left behind. In fact, the first 34 pages are dedicated to these disclaimers, possible repercussions with jilted loved ones, and the overall seriousness of disappearing. He makes it crystal clear that hiding is not a subject to be taken lightly.
After reading “How to Hide” I realized it wasn’t exactly what I thought it would be, specifically with regard to ‘assets’. I define ‘assets’ as anything of value: cars, boats, homes, investment accounts, etc. So ‘taking your assets with you’ by this definition would mean a way to maintain ownership of these items when disappearing. However, the advice given in the book said to sell everything and take only what you can fit in your car or on your person – hardly feasible if you have a large amount of ‘assets’. Upon finishing, I concluded that ‘assets’ for the purpose of this book meant ‘cash’. Wilkening does give a thorough amount of information on off-shore bank accounts but this is hardly practical for a majority of readers that aren’t looking to hide, much less those that are. While it’s definitely an option, his focused audience – the bankrupt, the divorced, and the abused – most likely cannot use this information in their respective realities.
“How to Hide: A Practical Guide to Vanishing and Taking Your Assets with You” is still an interesting read, written in a clear and concise style for those truly needing to disappear and start over. While there are enough editing errors to warrant mention, they did not deter from the book’s overall impact. The book is otherwise well organized and researched and David Wilkening does a fine job presenting the information at a level all readers can understand and apply.