No One Would Listen by Harry Markopolos about how he knew Bernie Madoff was a ponzi scheme is a great book in this genre. Markopolos went to the SEC with proof, multiple times, and each time the SEC blew him off.
int32_64 5 hours ago||
Never read Michael Lewis's book about SBF. It's so bad it permanently ruined him as an author in my mind, I doubt the verity of any of the other books he wrote as a result of it.
xhevahir 27 minutes ago||
Lewis has a weakness for characters with lots of chutzpah and self-confidence. Morry Taylor, SBF, John McCain, numerous Wall Street guys—he seems to lose perspective when he writes about them.
hingler36 4 hours ago|||
It really revealed how much he relied on the gift of hindsight when writing his earlier books. Nothing wrong with that per se, but it's something he should have been aware of when doing a book on an ongoing event.
kmac_ 4 hours ago||
Why? I really enjoyed the book, over-colorized, probably written to be made into a movie. He never portrayed SBF in a good or bad light, but he showed the mess SBF and his companions made.
naniel 6 hours ago||
Interesting list! I really enjoyed "The Square and the Tower" by Niall Ferguson. Not exactly in the same realm as these, but pretty close and definitely eye-opening
zabzonk 7 hours ago||
Not exactly a cult, but... "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" by Tom Wolfe. Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters. It sounds like fun, until it doesn't so much. Soundtrack by The Grateful Dead.
gmiller123456 7 hours ago||
"Seductive Poison" is a good one. It's a story about the "Koolaid suicide" cult. It's one lady's story about how she got indoctrinated, abused, and ultimately escaped from Jonestown. It's told from her perspective, and really does a good job of showing how a seemingly reasonable person can get wrapped up in that.
salutis 13 minutes ago|
+1 I loved Seductive Poison and have it on my list to re-read.
ccppurcell 7 hours ago||
If you haven't read it already, Fads and Fallacies by Martin Gardner is a great book. A bit more focused on pseudoscience than on cults but Scientology comes up for instance.
pahool 4 hours ago||
Stripping the Gurus by Geoffrey Falk is an interesting survey in this vein, albeit covering a previous generation of problematic cults. Gurus like Chogyam Trungpa, Adi Da (or whatever name Franklin Jones was going by at the time), even reaching back to Paramahansa Yogananda and Ramakrishna. His take is perhaps a little juvenile at times, but I think the book is an interesting survey.
ktallett 7 hours ago||
If we are talking about scams an obvious one is Bad Blood, about the Theranos scam.
fabriceleal 3 hours ago|
Ok, now I want the fiction books about cults, scams and schemes.
zabzonk 2 hours ago|
"Illuminatus!" I read this while suffering from the worst attack of flu (fever, hallucinations, the works) I have ever had, Edinburgh circa 1975. I thought I was going mad. Never dared to read it again.