Conspiracy of Fools: A True Story

Kurt Eichenwald

Rating: 4.0/5 Stars
Rank: 43

This enormous, intimate blow-by-blow of Enron's implosion gets as close to what actually happened, in terms of people making (bad) decisions in real time, as anyone who wasn't there with a concealed video-phone possibly could.

Having combed endless documents and interviewed countless principals and peripherals, Eichenwald (The Informant) presents short declarative sentences (and lots of sentence fragments) that may have run through the heads of men like top executives Skilling, Lay and Fastow as they managed to cook a very large set of books, as well as men like Stuart Zisman, a lawyer in the firm's wholesale division who wrote an early memo titled "Overall Book Manipulation" that stated "the majority of investments being introduced to Raptor are bad ones." Eichenwald's bald depictions ("Skilling sank deeper into depression"; "It couldn't be true, [Anderson partner Tom] Bauer thought") make for real tension.

Collegial meetings at the White House with Dick Cheney, Colin Powell and others; charged conference calls with skeptical investors; endless buy-ins, buyouts and acronyms—all are presented in a rat-a-tat style thick with corporate anxiety, keeping pages turning even as the details themselves are numbing. (Luckily, Eichenwald includes a "Cast of Characters" and "List of Deals" so that readers can remind themselves of past carnage.) As an unadorned attempt to get into the heads of some major manipulators, this book can hardly be bettered. (On sale Mar. 8)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc.
All rights reserved.

About the Author

has written for the New York Times for more than seventeen years. A two-time winner of the George Polk Award for excellence in journalism and a finalist for the 2000 Pulitzer Prize, he has been selected repeatedly for the TJFR Business News Reporter as one of the nation’s most influential financial journalists.

His last book, The Informant is currently in development as a major motion picture. He lives in Dallas with his wife and three children.

« Prev Product | Product Listings | Next Product »
Editorials(4) | Customer Reviews(25)

Editorials

Sample 3 of 4

Conspiracy of Fools: A True Story
Kurt Eichenwald


	From Publishers Weekly
	This enormous, intimate blow-by-blow of Enron's implosion gets as close to what actually happened, in terms of people making (bad) decisions in real time, as anyone who wasn't there with a concealed video-phone... read full editorial

	From Booklist
	New York Times reporter Eichenwald has now accomplished with the Enron scandal what he did with the ADM scandal in The Informant, rendering complex corporate skulduggery in the form of a page-turning financial thriller... read full editorial

	From the Inside Flap
	From an award-winning New York Times reporter comes the full, mind-boggling story of the lies, crimes, and ineptitude behind the spectacular scandal that imperiled a presidency, destroyed a marketplace, and changed... read full editorial

All Editorials(4) | Product Info | Product Listings

Customer Reviews

Sample 3 of 25

Conspiracy of Fools: A True Story
Kurt Eichenwald


	joe murphy
	March 23, 2005 - 4.0/5 stars
	A compelling book. As one of the many people financially affected by the Enron collapse, I'm happy to see the events being brought to light. It is thorough and often shocking. Mr. Eichenwald has a good ability to grip... read full review

	What is the truth
	(Boston, MA) April 3, 2005 - 3.0/5 stars
	I enjoyed this book as I did his other book "The Informant." Although I have a hard time defining which facts and conversations are true and what is conjecture. A friend called this morning and asked me to read the review... read full review

	Boring Fiction with too many characters
	(Mechanicsburg, PA) March 27, 2005 - 1.0/5 stars
	With close to 150 characters in this fictional tale, Eichenwald appears to have gotten lost. The book isn't the true story, and it isn't a business book. It's a combination of mumble jumble that tries to show Ken Lay isn't... read full review

All Customer Reviews(25) | Product Info | Product Listings

Top 10 Best Selling Business Book Categories

General	Accounting	Audiobooks	Bio's/Primers
Business Life	Careers	Economics	Finance
Professions	International	Investing	Management

Marketing/Sales	Personal Finance	Reference	Entrepreneurship