I read this because the people on Crooked Timber were all talking about it. I liked the article I linked above better than the book, but feel like it's my fault for not knowing sufficient history.

This book is the first of a trilogy in which the Republic that Plato describes in his book by that name is set up to see if it can actually work. The problem seems to lie in the fact that the metaphysical assumptions underlying Plato's arguments need to be valid (or, at least believed by those involved) for the idea to have a chance at all.

I'm going to read the second book of the trilogy next, which you might take as a vote of confidence in the first book, but it's really a vote of confidence in Ada Palmer who wrote the above article on Crooked Timber.