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What: Success Is A Choice: Ten Steps to Overachieving in Business and Life, by Rick Pitino with Bill Reynolds

Price: $25

I’ve been meaning to review this new book for months now, but frankly I just didn’t feel like it, thus breaking most of Rick Pitino’s 10 commandments for getting anywhere in life.

Pitino isn’t much for sloth and procrastination in his 288-page ode to Norman Vincent Peale. “Don’t put things off,” Pitino lectures in explaining Step 4, “Establish Good Work Habits.”

Pitino’s 10-step program is basically an East Coast co-opt of famed UCLA Coach John Wooden’s seminal “Pyramid of Success,” give or take a few obvious philosophy clashes.

While Wooden was a staunch believer in preparing his team rather than worrying about his opponent, Pitino states flatly: “I know that as a basketball coach I love to play any team whose coach has that philosophy, because we’ll win 95% of the time.”

OK, Rick, how about your ’96 national championship Kentucky team against Wooden’s Walton Gang?

Pitino obviously meant no disrespect toward Wooden, whom he lavishly praises in his book. The real hurt came when Pitino and star Ron Mercer snubbed last April’s Wooden Award ceremonies in Los Angeles. Pitino had a book signing stop in Lexington on the same day.

But enough about that, as Pitino’s Step 3 implores us to “Always Be Positive!”

Although Pitino has won only one national championship, he has established himself as America’s premiere “fix-it” coach, a man who turned around three downtrodden college programs--Boston U., Providence, Kentucky--and the NBA’s New York Knicks.

Writes Pitino: “Success is not a lucky break. It is not a divine right. It is not an accident of birth. Success is a choice.”

Pitino now embarks on his greatest challenge, having bolted Kentucky to take over the woeful Boston Celtics. If Pitino’s 10-step program fails there, he may need a 12-step program.