Sex on the Moon: The Amazing Story Behind the Most Audacious Heist in History
Ben Mezrich
I’m tempted to add a new category for books called “what the hell were you thinking?” Mezrich, author of The Accidental Billionaires (later made into the movie The Social Network) never seems to come close to answering this question. Sex on the Moon chronicles the brief rise and spectacular fall of Thad Roberts. Within a few short years of being thrown out of his crushing Mormon family, Roberts finds himself working at NASA. Driven by an immense desire to be an astronaut, Roberts flies through a triple major, extra-curricular groups and anything else he can do to increase his changes of someday walking on Mars. He is rewarded with an internship-type position at NASA. Then, mysteriously and so very close to a full-time...
Malled
Caitlin Kelly
Caitlin Kelly’s tell-all working retail behind the cash register is both shocking and unsurprising. Everyone knows that retail is a dead-end and most would work almost anywhere else. However, the total blind-eye that management and the average shopper turns to those working sales is both a sad, sickening and clearly why companies still continue to make massive profits. Despite often being the only contact a shopper may have with a company, these poorly paid peons have to know products (often with no training), clean the store, stock, ring up sales and returns and a myriad of other exhausting tasks, all with a required smile. Kelly does her research well and, in addition to her own battle stories, talks about retail work and workers in...
The Man in the Rockefeller Suit
Mark Seal
“The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed.” – paraphrased from Joseph Goebbels
There is something simply unbelievable in the stories of serial imposters like Frank Abaganle and “Clark Rockefeller”. How, you ask yourself, could so many people possibly believe such twaddle? And yet they do. Far above the class of metal-siding salesmen, these world-class liars create entire personas for themselves. Their tightly woven stories, embellished with the most garish and outrageous of stories, are costumed and acted day and night. The mask never slips. When someone gets too close, another mask is made in its place. While most imposters create their new selves to acquire wealth and power, in the case of German...
Money for Nothing
Edward Ugel
It is a bit sad how many Americans use the phrase “when I win the lottery…” before expressing a dream or desire. What is surprising is how many people do win the lottery – and what a lousy deal it often is. Many states don’t allow lump-sum payments. They instead give winners a pay-out over years and even decades – with no interest. While many people will think “Hell, I’ll take a steady $70,000 a year for the next 20 years” it doesn’t usually work this way. Winners blow through their money, and much more, in record time. And then they call someone like Ugel.
A gambler, failed film-student and bartender, Ugel landed a job working for a company he ominously calls “The...
Jesus Freaks – A True Story of Murder and Madness on the Evangelical Edge
Don Lattin
Touching on its early history, leaders of the movement and testimony of ex- and current members, Lattin presents a creepy portrait of the Children of God cult, otherwise known as The Family. The book loosely follows the life of David Berg, the charismatic and manipulative leader, and his chosen disciple, Ricky Rodriguez. Lattin tells the story of the rise of the cult, the death of Berg and Rodriguez’s murder of Sue Kauten in an attempt to find and kill his own abusive mother and save his sister. I’m surprised Hollywood hasn’t made a movie yet – or have they?
I.O.U Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay
John Lanchester
Lanchester, a Brit and writer by trade, started his research into the current financial debacle as background for a novel he was writing. He soon found a mind-boggling story worth telling without any fictional embellishment. His description of credit markets, hedge-funds, mortgages and other financial toys are remarkably clear and easy to understand. Lanchester peppers his description of the financial meltdown with stories of the self-satisfied bankers who helped create this debacle. The book is surprisingly readable, never dry and rich with a heavy serving of British snark and a soupcon of vitriol. The British take is any additional interesting facet.
So yes, the regulators were useless, but their failures wasn’t like that of a...