Irrationally passionate is the passionate journey of Jason Kothari’s entrepreneurial venture from being a rebel to be successful turnaround business expert. 

On first glance the book appears to be a lot of gyaan on entrepreneurship, something like a text book on entrepreneurship. I was prepared to be bored, but the very first page of the book hooked me. Jason Kothari takes you through the travails of his life from his childhood to his story of becoming a turnaround business genius. He gets you involved in his journey as he bargains with the Agra road side vendor for a chess set for Rs 30 from its original quoted price of Rs 500. Next you root for him as he fights his demons and acquires Valiant entertainments. The  challenges in his personal life pushing himself beyond his capabilities and some more to prove he deserves his title of being a turnaround entrepreneur. 

We have all loved comics in our childhood but i have never heard of anyone acquire his favorite comic company from bankruptcy. The episode of buying valiant was thrilling and I rooted for Jason as he ran around warehouses looking for documents studying and finding loopholes in bankruptcy laws, as well as studying for his projects in Wharton, all this at the age of nineteen.

We often see stories of people who achieve so much in life but they cant handle their success or failures with the same tenacity. Jason on the other hand is a fine example of balancing both success and taking losses with a grain of salt. I like how he takes a page from everything he faces in life, his feeling of being a misfit in a land he didn’t think he belonged to, his setbacks in his personal life to his health breakdown or lessons from finding answers in his spiritual endeavors,  lessons from his experiences laying off people, or his Thai Muay fighting bouts. 

Turning around Housing.com and getting Snapdeal, freecharge, vulcan out of the woods was just as interesting. We had all read about the flipkart trying to take over snapdeal story. I got the real and whole story from the horses mouth. From my side i had never known that Softbank was into so many projects in India. The Emaar story was a bit flat but I think after reading so many interesting accounts I was craving for more unputdownable stories.   I liked how Jason ended each of his business endeavors with a win win feel. I guess we all wish to achieve that but few of us actually manage to attain that. For one person to achieve so many turnaround opportunities in such a short duration of time plus the grueling work that goes into each one makes his relentless journey very interesting.

The book ends with Jason’s seven pillars of a start-up. All in all it was an easy read and gripping with absolutely smooth flowing easy to comprehend language. A must read for all start-up entrepreneurs and also entrepreneurs in peril.