-
Seasonal Offer:
This title is part of our Seasonal Offers promotion.
Too Big to Fail: Inside the Battle to Save Wall Street
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Too Big to Fail: Inside the Battle to Save Wall Street for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Special Offers and Product Promotions
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
Product Description
Review
He has done a remarkable job in producing a lively account that will be hard for subsequent authors to beat (Gillian Tett, FT )
As close to a definitive account as we are likely to get (Dominic Lawson, Sunday Times )
Andrew Ross Sorkin has written a fascinating, scene-by-scene saga of the eyeless trying to march the clueless through Great Depression II (Tom Wolfe )
Andrew Ross Sorkin pens what may be the definitive history of the banking crisis (The Atlantic Monthly )
Sorkin has succeeded in writing the book of the crisis, with amazing levels of detail and access (Reuters )
Too good to put down . . . It is the story of the actors in the most extraordinary financial spectacle in 80 years, and it is told brilliantly . . . It is hard to imagine them being this riveting (Economist )
Sorkin can write. His storytelling makes Liar's Poker look like a children's book (SNL Financial )
The most readable and exciting report of the events surrounding the Lehman collapse that we have seen . . . impeccably sourced (Edmund Conway, Daily Telegraph )
The sense of being in the meeting rooms as hitherto all-conquering alpha male egos fight for their reputations, as their and our world judders, is palpable (Chris Blackhurst, Evening Standard )
Surpassed its rivals with its depth, range of reporting and high quality analysis (Stefan Stern, FT )
A superbly researched and sobering take on the events surrounding the meltdown on Wall Street (Sam Mendes )
With Too Big to Fail , Andrew Ross Sorkin has broken the Barbarians [At The Gate] curse ... Ross Sorkin's ... astonishing narrative of the epic financial crisis of 2008 is an extraordinary achievement that will be hard to surpass as the definitive account (John Gapper, FT )
The heir to Barbarians at the Gate (FT )
As close to a definitive account as we are likely to get (Dominic Lawson, Sunday Times )
Andrew Ross Sorkin has written a fascinating, scene-by-scene saga of the eyeless trying to march the clueless through Great Depression II (Tom Wolfe )
Andrew Ross Sorkin pens what may be the definitive history of the banking crisis (The Atlantic Monthly )
Sorkin has succeeded in writing the book of the crisis, with amazing levels of detail and access (Reuters )
Too good to put down . . . It is the story of the actors in the most extraordinary financial spectacle in 80 years, and it is told brilliantly . . . It is hard to imagine them being this riveting (Economist )
Sorkin can write. His storytelling makes Liar's Poker look like a children's book (SNL Financial )
The most readable and exciting report of the events surrounding the Lehman collapse that we have seen . . . impeccably sourced (Edmund Conway, Daily Telegraph )
The sense of being in the meeting rooms as hitherto all-conquering alpha male egos fight for their reputations, as their and our world judders, is palpable (Chris Blackhurst, Evening Standard )
Surpassed its rivals with its depth, range of reporting and high quality analysis (Stefan Stern, FT )
A superbly researched and sobering take on the events surrounding the meltdown on Wall Street (Sam Mendes )
With Too Big to Fail , Andrew Ross Sorkin has broken the Barbarians [At The Gate] curse ... Ross Sorkin's ... astonishing narrative of the epic financial crisis of 2008 is an extraordinary achievement that will be hard to surpass as the definitive account (John Gapper, FT )
The heir to Barbarians at the Gate (FT )
Review
He has done a remarkable job in producing a lively account that will be hard for subsequent authors to beat Gillian Tett, FT As close to a definitive account as we are likely to get Dominic Lawson, Sunday Times Andrew Ross Sorkin has written a fascinating, scene-by-scene saga of the eyeless trying to march the clueless through Great Depression II Tom Wolfe Andrew Ross Sorkin pens what may be the definitive history of the banking crisis The Atlantic Monthly Sorkin has succeeded in writing the book of the crisis, with amazing levels of detail and access Reuters Too good to put down ... It is the story of the actors in the most extraordinary financial spectacle in 80 years, and it is told brilliantly ... It is hard to imagine them being this riveting Economist Sorkin can write. His storytelling makes Liar's Poker look like a children's book SNL Financial The most readable and exciting report of the events surrounding the Lehman collapse that we have seen ... impeccably sourced Edmund Conway, Daily Telegraph The sense of being in the meeting rooms as hitherto all-conquering alpha male egos fight for their reputations, as their and our world judders, is palpable Chris Blackhurst, Evening Standard Surpassed its rivals with its depth, range of reporting and high quality analysis Stefan Stern, FT A superbly researched and sobering take on the events surrounding the meltdown on Wall Street Sam Mendes With Too Big to Fail , Andrew Ross Sorkin has broken the Barbarians [At The Gate] curse ... Ross Sorkin's ... astonishing narrative of the epic financial crisis of 2008 is an extraordinary achievement that will be hard to surpass as the definitive account John Gapper, FT The heir to Barbarians at the Gate FT
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
45 of 46 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
The global recession that raged through the entire globe in 2008-2009 was one of the biggest in history. The causes are complicated and it underlined how interconnected the global economy really is.
What Sorkin does is introduce the major (mainly American) players in this tale of an inexorable slide into chaos across the world's economies and show you what they were thinking and how they responded. In 100 years this book will be priceless as we get a look at the human element more than the numbers. He interviewed them, and dissected their statements with colleagues what this leaves us with is a day by day guide to what happened.
It reads almost like a Dan Brown thriller, it is page turning stuff which is a major achievement as this is ultimately a tale of middle aged men talking a lot about sub prime mortgages, however jargon is either avoided or explained and the sheer pace and authority of the writing pulls you in and keeps you engaged.
In short this is a must read.
If you liked this there's more historical debate and fun at @HistoryGems on Facebook and Twitter
What Sorkin does is introduce the major (mainly American) players in this tale of an inexorable slide into chaos across the world's economies and show you what they were thinking and how they responded. In 100 years this book will be priceless as we get a look at the human element more than the numbers. He interviewed them, and dissected their statements with colleagues what this leaves us with is a day by day guide to what happened.
It reads almost like a Dan Brown thriller, it is page turning stuff which is a major achievement as this is ultimately a tale of middle aged men talking a lot about sub prime mortgages, however jargon is either avoided or explained and the sheer pace and authority of the writing pulls you in and keeps you engaged.
In short this is a must read.
If you liked this there's more historical debate and fun at @HistoryGems on Facebook and Twitter
30 of 31 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This fascinating and compulsively readable book seeks to spill the beans on what was going on at the highest levels during those calamitous weeks in summer/autumn 2008 when the financial system of the U.S. (and beyond) was on the brink of collapse. Using a vast amount of interviews with a number of the top bank CEOs, their boards and colleagues and with the top players in government (possibly with the exception of Ben Bernanke), Sorkin has created a remarkable narrative illuminating exactly what happened behind closed doors as Lehman Brothers sunk and AIG and American finance's most storied institutions tottered on the brink, culminating in the notorious 'bailout' legislation. The conversations, the phonecalls, the deals, the shuttling back-and-forth, the extraordinary meetings of the heads of the mafia-like Wall Street 'families,' the fear and the panic: it's all here in this gripping book.
It's a great read and the author succeeds admirably in his stated aim of showing these titans of the economy as human beings under immense strain, being forced to improvise their way through the most testing of circumstances. It makes the macho world of high, high finance seductive and intriguing and made me hungry to read more books from the business section. The writer even makes the people he portrays come across sympathetically and it is good to see the British government, in a cameo role, standing up for itself in the face of American pressure (not that it seems that way to the Americans themselves!)
However, it fails to go further. Sorkin provides very little in the way of context and analysis. There is a brief prologue and epilogue and there are short profiles of the major movers & shakers and their institutions but the fact that the publishers have rushed to get this book on to the shelves is evident. I don't mean merely the odd typo that exists or the couple of instances of an identical sentence showing up in adjacent paragraphs, or even the few rather terrible purple passages there are at the start of the book-proper; it is the feeling that the nature - or even the true gravity - of the situation is not properly communicated to the reader. Sure, the panic is there and the events are clearly incredible and people are quoted about how dire things are, but the author rarely interjects with the naked truth from outside of the bubble that his big-wig characters inhabit. For example, newspaper/broadcast stories are only mentioned if one of the protagonists is reading/watching them. It's not a problem so much when we reach the fateful 'Lehman weekend' and the narrative-time stretches out to cover events blow-by-blow, but it is especially lacking in the book's first half and final section. (It ends too abruptly as well, followed by an epilogue that feels like a tacked-on magazine-section feature.) This, in my view, stops the book from being the masterpiece it could have been with a bit more time and a few more paragraphs on the perspective from outside of the Washington/Wall Street gilded play-pen.
In 20 years time, this will be still be a valuable resource, but other books will be needed to fill in the gaps. If Sorkin were to produce a revised edition, this could be THE book on the crisis. Well worth reading as it is though.
It's a great read and the author succeeds admirably in his stated aim of showing these titans of the economy as human beings under immense strain, being forced to improvise their way through the most testing of circumstances. It makes the macho world of high, high finance seductive and intriguing and made me hungry to read more books from the business section. The writer even makes the people he portrays come across sympathetically and it is good to see the British government, in a cameo role, standing up for itself in the face of American pressure (not that it seems that way to the Americans themselves!)
However, it fails to go further. Sorkin provides very little in the way of context and analysis. There is a brief prologue and epilogue and there are short profiles of the major movers & shakers and their institutions but the fact that the publishers have rushed to get this book on to the shelves is evident. I don't mean merely the odd typo that exists or the couple of instances of an identical sentence showing up in adjacent paragraphs, or even the few rather terrible purple passages there are at the start of the book-proper; it is the feeling that the nature - or even the true gravity - of the situation is not properly communicated to the reader. Sure, the panic is there and the events are clearly incredible and people are quoted about how dire things are, but the author rarely interjects with the naked truth from outside of the bubble that his big-wig characters inhabit. For example, newspaper/broadcast stories are only mentioned if one of the protagonists is reading/watching them. It's not a problem so much when we reach the fateful 'Lehman weekend' and the narrative-time stretches out to cover events blow-by-blow, but it is especially lacking in the book's first half and final section. (It ends too abruptly as well, followed by an epilogue that feels like a tacked-on magazine-section feature.) This, in my view, stops the book from being the masterpiece it could have been with a bit more time and a few more paragraphs on the perspective from outside of the Washington/Wall Street gilded play-pen.
In 20 years time, this will be still be a valuable resource, but other books will be needed to fill in the gaps. If Sorkin were to produce a revised edition, this could be THE book on the crisis. Well worth reading as it is though.
14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition
The book itself is OK- interesting in parts, quite boring in others, and I found Sorkin's conclusions on the whole sorry mess unconvincing, more journalistic than properly analytical. Michael Lewis' A Big Short was a much more enjoyable read.
The Kindle Edition however was unacceptably bad: full of typos, spelling errors, and even whole passages of text repeated accidentally. Worst, the photos at the back of the book were entirely missing. Fortunately, as usual Amazon customer services were very good and refunded me as soon as I complained- I then used the refunded money to buy the iBooks edition instead, which was much more polished and had all the photos in it. Putting faces to all the grey banker types mentioned in the book is surprisingly illuminating, so I would avoid the Kindle edition and either buy the paperback or the iBooks e-version.
The Kindle Edition however was unacceptably bad: full of typos, spelling errors, and even whole passages of text repeated accidentally. Worst, the photos at the back of the book were entirely missing. Fortunately, as usual Amazon customer services were very good and refunded me as soon as I complained- I then used the refunded money to buy the iBooks edition instead, which was much more polished and had all the photos in it. Putting faces to all the grey banker types mentioned in the book is surprisingly illuminating, so I would avoid the Kindle edition and either buy the paperback or the iBooks e-version.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A truly valuable insight
As a business student I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I would like to clear up a few things from previous reviews.
1. This book has been labelled too journalistic. Read more
1. This book has been labelled too journalistic. Read more
Published 19 days ago by Emma Louise
depressing really
The book is interesting in parts and gives some insight to outsiders (99.999999999999% of the human race) what goes on behind the closed doors of the banks and the sort of "SMART"... Read more
Published 2 months ago by D. Glancy
Great read!
I haven't read Paulson's book, but this one feels like the definitive account.
Very well written, great job by Sorkin. Great read!
Very well written, great job by Sorkin. Great read!
Published 3 months ago by Ivo
'Has all the drama of a Hollywood movie'
Okay, so I took the tag line off the back cover of the book, it seems that I agree with the views of a Telegraph journalist. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Habeeb
Complex but Brilliant!
I loved another book which was about the 1929 crash ("The Day The Bubble Burst") because it had the personal stories mixed with the business lives. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Nick Bird
Turns Wall Street Collapse into a Blockbuster Novel
If you want a book that provides detailed analysis into every economic, systemic and human reason why the American (and later the global) financial system collapsed in 2008, this... Read more
Published 4 months ago by jonnygib66
It didn't cover it for me
It will give you some idea about what happened but if you're looking for an understanding from a perspective of someone outside of the financial or economics world like me then... Read more
Published 4 months ago by steve
Insight into banking crisis
This is a most useful book which sets out the circumstances around the collapse of various banking institutions in the US in 2008. It gives a blow by blow account of what happened. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Rf And Tm Walters
too good to miss
This is by far the best book I have read of the many on the events of the financial crisis of 2008, the effects of which are of course still very much with us today. Read more
Published 4 months ago by markr
How The Mighty Fell
Extremely readable and fascinating account of biggest financial fiasco of all time. Some hard work needed to make sense of all the financial shenanigans but worth the effort. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Ruth Hilton
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Search Customer Discussions
|
![[Start the discussion]](http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/02/x-locale/communities/discussion_boards/start-new-discussion-sec._V192198663_.gif){kind=small}
Listmania!
![Economics in a time of crisis [in no order]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51EM%2BxozGXL._AA60_.jpg)
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
