I love, love the musical, while finding the book merely decent. But of course the book led to the musical, and of course I view the musical through the eyes of someone who's read the book (though not recently enough that the differences between the two bother me), so I see things in the musical that aren't actually there (a more fleshed out Turk, the background story of Eric, and the like). So if it's just about the story, I agree with you in preferring the book. But it's a musical, so it has to be about the songs more than about the story...