I've read it. I think if I were born in 1950 it would be worth its weight in gold. Someday someone will write a similar book that would have worked perfectly for people who were born in 1980; unfortunately, by then it will be too late for us and instead the next generation will debate its (in)applicability to their lives.
It's not fatalistic. As I've been saying all along, you have some control of some things. Exercising that control constructively is necessary. It simply is not sufficient.
Take a look at the stock market returns for the last 5, 10, 20 years. At pretty much any point you could have invested and had handsome returns by today.
I also know people who abandoned the market at the bottom of one of the various dips. They're all bitter about the recoveries since. Taking a longer view, the various machinations of the market that seemed so important at the time are lost in the width of the line on the graph.
Yes, your choices are by far the #1 factor in any success, or lack of, that you have. Telling your children anything less is a disservice.
It's not fatalistic. As I've been saying all along, you have some control of some things. Exercising that control constructively is necessary. It simply is not sufficient.