`Voldemort Book' Destroys Merrill, `Zombie Economics': Top Business Books
With so many business books being published each month, we’re often asked for recommendations. Here are 30 of our favorite hardbacks published this year.
“Adam Smith” by Nicholas Phillipson (Yale/Allen Lane). This “intellectual biography” documents how Smith’s “The Wealth of Nations” grew out of the Scottish Enlightenment.
“Aftershock” by Robert B. Reich (Knopf). The former U.S. Labor Secretary explores how 30 years of growing income inequality helped bring on the Great Recession.
“All the Devils Are Here” by Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera (Portfolio). A detailed account of how the financial crisis bubbled up from a volatile, and bipartisan, mixture of government meddling and laissez-faire.
“American Colossus” by H.W. Brands (Doubleday). A big, brash narrative history that shows how capitalism triumphed over democracy between 1865 and 1900.
“The Big Short” by Michael Lewis (Norton/Allen Lane). The author of “Liar’s Poker” tells the story of a loner with a glass eye and other outliers who shorted the subprime market.
“Broke, USA” by Gary Rivlin (HarperBusiness). Rivlin, a tireless reporter, takes a queasy journey through what he calls “Poverty Inc.,” where the rich get richer by lending to the working poor.
“Chasing Goldman Sachs” by Suzanne McGee (Crown Business). A disturbing account of how Goldman Sachs Group Inc. became a seductively successful Pied Piper, luring rival banks down a path to destruction.
“Crash of the Titans” by Greg Farrell (Crown Business). An exhaustive reconstruction of how Merrill Lynch & Co. sealed its own fate by becoming more bullish on bonuses than on America.
“Crisis Economics” by Nouriel Roubini and Stephen Mihm (Penguin Press/Allen Lane). The prescient New York University professor explains why booms and busts occur.
“Dealings” by Felix Rohatyn (Simon & Schuster). A charming if slippery memoir of the Lazard Freres banker’s life in finance and politics.
“The Devil’s Casino” by Vicky Ward (Wiley). A look at the destructive rivalry among Richard S. Fuld Jr. and four other men who rose to power at Lehman in the 1980s.
“Diary of a Very Bad Year” by Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager, n+1 and Keith Gessen (Harper Perennial). Gessen, a founding editor of literary magazine n+1, presents an arresting clutch of interviews that he says he conducted with an anonymous hedge-fund manager during the crisis.
“The End of Wall Street” by Roger Lowenstein (Penguin Press). A decade after capturing the hubris of Long-Term Capital Management LP in “When Genius Failed,” Lowenstein reports on what he calls “the mother of all bubbles.”
“The Facebook Effect” by David Kirkpatrick (Simon & Schuster). An engrossing and scrupulously fair history of how Mark Zuckerberg built the social-networking website.
“Fault Lines” by Raghuram G. Rajan (Princeton). The University of Chicago professor shows why our flawed financial order risks driving us “from bubble to bubble.”
“Freefall” by Joseph E. Stiglitz (Norton/Allen Lane). The Nobel Prize-winning economist describes the flawed theories and misguided policies that wrought the meltdown.
“The Hellhound of Wall Street” by Michael Perino (Penguin Press). A page-turning history of how Ferdinand Pecora’s investigation into the Crash of 1929 helped lawmakers curb abuses on Wall Street.
“High Financier” by Niall Ferguson (Penguin Press/Allen Lane). The Harvard historian presents a fresh assessment of how and why Siegmund Warburg rose to fame in postwar London.
“Identity Economics” by George A. Akerlof and Rachel E. Kranton (Princeton). Decisions that shape our lives often hinge on our perceived place in society, not solely on a calculation of financial costs and benefits.
“The Invisible Hands” by Steven Drobny (Wiley). The co- founder of Drobny Global Advisors frets that taxpayers may end up bailing out pension plans. He blames Harvard’s class of ‘69.
“More Money Than God” by Sebastian Mallaby (Penguin Press/Bloomsbury). A storied history of hedge-fund luminaries, from Alfred Winslow Jones to Ken Griffin.
“No One Would Listen” by Harry Markopolos (Wiley). A first-person account of the struggle to convince the Securities and Exchange Commission that Bernard Madoff’s returns were mathematically impossible.
“On the Brink” by Henry M. Paulson Jr. (Business Plus). The former U.S. Treasury secretary describes his fight to prop up the financial system.
“Priceless” by William Poundstone (Hill and Wang). Companies, restaurants and even artists exploit psychology to extract more cash from the rest of us, as Poundstone shows.
“The Quants” by Scott Patterson (Crown Business). A behind-the-scenes look at the turbulent lives of four quants, including Ken Griffin.
“The Rise and Fall of Bear Stearns” by Alan C. Greenberg (Simon & Schuster). The former chairman, a self-described “bald guy wearing a bowtie,” tells his side of the story.
“The Sugar King of Havana” by John Paul Rathbone (Penguin Press). An evocative mixture of history and memoir that traces the rise and fall of Cuban sugar magnate Julio Lobo.
“13 Bankers” by Simon Johnson and James Kwak (Pantheon). Unless too-big-to-fail banks are broken up, they will trigger another meltdown, the authors say.
“War at the Wall Street Journal” by Sarah Ellison (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). An inside look at Rupert Murdoch’s takeover.
“Zombie Economics” by John Quiggin (Princeton). Quiggin, an Australian economist, guides us through the graveyard of flawed concepts that underpinned the Great Credit Crackup.
(James Pressley writes for Muse, the arts and leisure section of Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)
To contact the writer on the story: James Pressley in Brussels at jpressley@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Manuela Hoelterhoff at mhoelterhoff@bloomberg.net.
"Crash of the Titans"
Random House via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "Crash of the Titans: Greed, Hubris, The Fall of Merrill Lynch, and the Collapse of Bank of America" by Greg Farrell.
The cover jacket of "Crash of the Titans: Greed, Hubris, The Fall of Merrill Lynch, and the Collapse of Bank of America" by Greg Farrell. Source: Random House via Bloomberg
"The Hellhound of Wall Street"
Penguin Press via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "The Hellhound of Wall Street: How Ferdinand Pecora's Investigation of the Great Crash Forever Changed American Finance" by Michael Perino.
The cover jacket of "The Hellhound of Wall Street: How Ferdinand Pecora's Investigation of the Great Crash Forever Changed American Finance" by Michael Perino. Source: Penguin Press via Bloomberg
"All The Devils Are Here"
Penguin Group via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of the book "All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis" by Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera.
The cover jacket of the book "All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis" by Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera. Source: Penguin Group via Bloomberg
"Dealings"
Simon & Schuster via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "Dealings: A Political and Financial Life" by Felix Rohatyn.
The cover jacket of "Dealings: A Political and Financial Life" by Felix Rohatyn. Source: Simon & Schuster via Bloomberg
"American Colossus"
Doubleday via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "American Colossus: The Triumph of Capitalism 1865-1900" by H.W. Brands.
The cover jacket of "American Colossus: The Triumph of Capitalism 1865-1900" by H.W. Brands. Source: Doubleday via Bloomberg
"The Big Short"
Norton via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "The Big Short." The book is by Michael Lewis, author of the best-selling "Liar's Poker."
The cover jacket of "The Big Short." The book is by Michael Lewis, author of the best-selling "Liar's Poker." Source: Norton via Bloomberg
"Broke USA"
Harper Business via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "Broke USA: From Pawn Shops to Poverty, Inc. -- How the Working Poor Became Big Business." The book is the latest by Gary Rivlin.
The cover jacket of "Broke USA: From Pawn Shops to Poverty, Inc. -- How the Working Poor Became Big Business." The book is the latest by Gary Rivlin. Source: Harper Business via Bloomberg
`Crisis Economics' Cover
Penguin Press via Bloomberg
A photo shows the book jacket of 'Crisis Economics', the new book by Nouriel Roubini and Stephen Mihm.
A photo shows the book jacket of 'Crisis Economics', the new book by Nouriel Roubini and Stephen Mihm. Source: Penguin Press via Bloomberg
"High Financier"
Penguin Group via Bloomberg
The U.S. cover jacket of the book "High Financier: The Lives and Time of Siegmund Warburg." The book is the latest by Niall Ferguson.
The U.S. cover jacket of the book "High Financier: The Lives and Time of Siegmund Warburg." The book is the latest by Niall Ferguson. Source: Penguin Group via Bloomberg
"More Money Than God"
Penguin Group via Bloomberg
The cover jacket of "More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite." The book is the latest by Sebastian Mallaby.
The cover jacket of "More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite." The book is the latest by Sebastian Mallaby. Source: Penguin Group via Bloomberg
"The Rise and Fall of Bear Sterns"
Simon & Schuster via Bloomberg
The cover of "The Rise and Fall of Bear Sterns," by Alan "Ace" C. Greenberg.
The cover of "The Rise and Fall of Bear Sterns," by Alan "Ace" C. Greenberg. Source: Simon & Schuster via Bloomberg
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