FEBRUARY 2011 - AudioFile
The story of Enron’s rise and fall is one of innovation betrayed by arrogance and intelligence subverted by greed. Dennis Boutsikaris narrates as if he’d been there. His voice is pleasant, and he mostly keeps a good pace though that makes some complicated business and financial matters go by rather quickly. He ably uses patterns of inflection and intonation, especially a certain dryness and wryness, to express the disbelief, disapprobation, bemusement, and occasional schadenfreude the events merit. Those patterns are sometimes repetitious, but so are the patterns of human and corporate wrongdoing that fill this book. Boutsikaris makes the tawdry, sometimes-complex story easy to listen to. W.M. © AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine
Enron, that microcosm of American corporate misdeeds, continues to captivate us. Not since Watergate has a scandal reverberated through so many books. In The Smartest Guys in the Room, Bethany McLean, the first journalist to "out" the story in a major national publication, and eagle-eyed investigative reporter Peter Elkind endow the unfolding story with the gathering tension of a well-turned novel. Their rendering of boardroom feuds and bookkeeping trickery casts vivid light on the strong personalities involved.
The New York Times
The portrait of the narcissistic culture fostered by Enron's president, Kenneth Lay, since the mid-1980's is so vivid that the reader is amazed but not really shocked when the boom of the late 90's provides the spark that ultimately engulfs the entire enterprise in flames.
— Jonathan A. Knee
Publishers Weekly
Fortune reporter McLean's article in early 2001 questioning Enron's high valuation was cited by many as an early harbinger of the company's downfall, but she refrains from tooting her own horn, admitting that the article "barely scratched the surface" of what was wrong at America's seventh-largest corporation. The story of its plunge into bankruptcy (co-written with magazine colleague Elkind) barely touches upon the personal flamboyances highlighted in earlier Enron books, focusing instead on the shady finances and the corporate culture that made them possible. Former CEO Jeff Skilling gets much of the blame for hiring people who constantly played by their own rules, creating a "deeply dysfunctional workplace" where "financial deception became almost inevitable," but specific accountability for the underhanded transactions is passed on to others, primarily chief financial officer Andrew Fastow, whose financial conflicts of interest are recounted in exacting detail. (Skilling seems to have cooperated extensively with the authors, though clearly not to universal advantage.) A companywide sense of entitlement, particularly at the top executive levels, comes under close scrutiny, although the extravagant habits of those like Ken Lay, while blatant, are presented without fanfare. The real detail is saved for transactions like the deals that led to the California energy crisis and a 1986 scandal, mirroring the problems faced a decade later, that left the company "less than worthless" until a last-minute rescue. The book's sober financial analysis supplements that of Mimi Swartz's Power Failure, while offering additional perspectives that flesh out the details of the Enron story. (Oct. 13) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
Take your chances: this study is embargoed. Fortune writer McLean's "Is Enron Overpriced?" shows she had doubts about Enron way back in March 2001. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Soundview Executive Book Summaries
The biggest and most shocking business story of our time is the Enron debacle, and Fortune's senior writers Bethany Mclean and Peter Elkind have dug up the full story of the players and the plays that created the scandal of the century. The Smartest Guys in the Room details the rise and fall of the Enron empire as well as its cast of intriguing characters in a gripping narrative that is based on a wide range of private documents and exclusive sources. Copyright © 2003 Soundview Executive Book Summaries
From the Publisher
The best book about the Enron debacle to date.”
—BusinessWeek
“The authors write with power and finesse. Their prose is effortless, like a sprinter floating down the track.”
—USA Today
“Well-reported and well-written.”
—Warren Buffett
FEBRUARY 2011 - AudioFile
The story of Enron’s rise and fall is one of innovation betrayed by arrogance and intelligence subverted by greed. Dennis Boutsikaris narrates as if he’d been there. His voice is pleasant, and he mostly keeps a good pace though that makes some complicated business and financial matters go by rather quickly. He ably uses patterns of inflection and intonation, especially a certain dryness and wryness, to express the disbelief, disapprobation, bemusement, and occasional schadenfreude the events merit. Those patterns are sometimes repetitious, but so are the patterns of human and corporate wrongdoing that fill this book. Boutsikaris makes the tawdry, sometimes-complex story easy to listen to. W.M. © AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine
