Too Big to Fail

• Author: Andrew Ross Sorkin
• Amazon Link

I like to intersperse fiction and non-fiction in my reading lists. A continuous stream of fiction novels is akin to an overdose of candy while too much non-fiction can be dull and depressing. So every now and then I break away from the novels to some interesting non-fiction books. The financial crisis of the last decade (it is 2011 already :-) certainly gave us a lot to worry about and I was eager to read about an up close and personal narration of the events on Wall Street. After a bit of digging around on amazon, I decided that this book had everything going for it - the author was a New York Times Reporter with direct experience of the events, it had lots of positive reviews on amazon and was highly recommended by the leading financial newspapers, magazines, etc.

If you read no further, let me assure you that this book lives up to its reputation is a must read for anyone that is interested in the banking crisis that threatened to take down the world economy. The book starts with the activities around the fire-sale of Bear Sterns to JP Morgan, but the majority of the book is focused on Lehman, it's internal power struggles, and the mis-steps that kept it tottering on the brink of disaster before it finally collapsed. The main characters are the CEOs of the major banks in the US but the supporting cast of the C-level executives and outside consultants can very quickly overwhelm and confuse the reader. I found myself referring back to the list of who's who way too often. This book should really be sold with a cheat-sheet of the major characters codified in a handy bookmark. Apart from the character recognition the book is very well written and is a breeze to read.

The best part of the book is the case study you can make of the top CEOs and their leadership styles. There's plenty to learn from the ways the different CEOs led their company during those tumultuous times. Do you only believe the information that you are fed from within the organization or listen to some of the nay-sayers from outside ? Do you make a change to your trusted lieutenant who has lost the confidence of his peers ? Those heady days were rife with deals that had to be made over a weekend, and it is very instructive to look at the ones that succeeded and the ones that failed. Was there anything different that could have been done to change the outcome of those negotiations? I am sure a lot of people will continue to ponder on that, but there is no changing history. There's plenty more in the book and it is told in a very engaging style that even though there are 500+ pages in the book, they go by very quickly. Overall, this book does a an excellent job of detailing the events surrounding the financial meltdown and is a very pleasant read to boot.