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Conspiracy of Fools: A True Story
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Sales rank 230,113
Customers rating (based on 149 reviews)
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From an award-winning New York Times reporter comes the full, mind-boggling story of the lies, crimes, and ineptitude behind the spectacular scandal that imperiled a presidency, destroyed a marketplace, and changed Washington and Wall Street forever . . . It was the corporate collapse that appeared to come out of nowhere. In late 2001, the Enron Corporation--a darling of the financial world, a company whose executives were friends of presidents and the powerful--imploded virtually overnight, leaving vast wreckage in its wake and sparking a criminal investigation that would last for years. But for all that has been written about the Enron debacle, no one has yet to re-create the full drama of what has already become a near-mythic American tale.Until now. With Conspiracy of Fools, Kurt Eichenwald transforms the unbelievable story of the Enron scandal into a rip-roaring narrative of epic proportions, one that is sure to delight readers of thrillers and business books alike, achieving for this new decade what books like Barbarians at the Gate and A Civil Action accomplished in the 1990’s.Written in the roller-coaster style of a novel, the compelling narrative takes readers behind every closed door--from the Oval Office to the executive suites, from the highest reaches of the Justice Department to the homes and bedrooms of the top officers. It is a tale of global reach--from Houston to Washington, from Bombay to London, from Munich to Sao Paolo--laying out the unbelievable scenes that twisted together to create this shocking true story. Eichenwald reveals never-disclosed details of a story that features a cast including George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Paul O’Neill, Harvey Pitt, Colin Powell, Gray Davis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Alan Greenspan, Ken Lay, Andy Fastow, Jeff Skilling, Bill Clinton, Rupert Murdoch and Sumner Redstone. With its you-are-there glimpse into the secretive worlds of corporate power, Conspiracy of Fools is an all-true financial and political thriller of cinematic proportions.
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| Publisher | Broadway | | Release date | 03/2005 | | Availability | | | Edition | Hardcover |
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 Entertaining but Probably Deserved an Asterick *
'Conspiracy of Fools' is a very interesting, fast paced book that captures the essence of the most interesting corporate scandal in modern US history. Kurt Eichenwald should be commended for his in-depth research of what was a very complicated situation. That said, I do believe the subtitle ("A True Story") truly deserves an asterick * because Eichenwald essentially reconstructs about 10,000+ conversations that he was clearly speculating on. In other words, the book literally has the various characters talking to each other and there is no acknowledgement by the author that he took some very large creative license in reconstructing these conversations. I actually found this literary technique interesting but I think it raises some troubling issues in calling this is a "true story." I also think Eichenwald was way too friendly to Skilling and Lay in this account, and essentially blamed Fastow for the entire event. As the 'Smartest Guys in the Room' showed, all of these men were responsible in their own ways.
Regardless of the critiques, I did like the book and would recommend it to someone wanting to learn about the Enron debacle.
 Reads like a novel.
Conspiracy of Fools by Kurt Eichenwald, a meticulously researched telling of the Enron collapse, has a surprisingly compelling narrative which reads like a novel. This richly detailed story of greed and arrogance entertains without sacrificing accuracy. Moreover, Eichenwald clears up a number of commonly held misconceptions about the Enron saga, including the circumstances surrounding Jeff Skilling's abrupt resignation.
As far as the three major players are concerned, Eichenwald's research paints the following portraits:
Ken Lay- With a PhD. in economics and a resume that made him a credible candidate for Secretary of the Treasury, Lay was not stupid. However, he allowed an anything goes corporate culture to flourish at Enron. Eichenwald shows that illegalities were tolerated at Enron before Fastow or Skilling were ever hired.
Jeff Skilling- Immature, arrogant and willfully ignorant of how Enron consistently generated substantial earnings quarter after quarter despite the lack of profitability among its many component divisions.
Andy Fastow- Incredibly greedy and amoral. Unqualified to be CFO of a major corporation. Beloved by Skilling and Lay because he made it look like he was bringing huge profits to Enron even as he was shamelessly stealing from its shareholders.
Also culpable in this very tragic tale are the SEC, Merrill Lynch and other investment banks and the accounting firm Arthur Andersen.
Conspiracy of Fools documents how the collapse of Enron simultaneously brought about the collapse of Arthur Andersen as well.
Bottom line: A must read for those wishing to know the details behind the collapse of Enron. An event that proved tragic for thousands of shareholders, employees and pensioners. And one which presaged even greater corporate upheavals that would follow.
Conspiracy of Foolds
I began reading this book with some misgivings because the subject matter isn't exactly tea fare. Having not read anything by Kurt Eichenwald until now, I was thrilled with his writing style. I lived in Dallas during all the hoopla and news of the demise of Enron so I was somewhat familiar with the main characters. Eichenwald does a marvelous job of developing these characters and their personalities with all their pluses and minuses. Unadulterated greed is at the heart of this whole experience and he exposes this at every turn. This is a thick book, but I couldn't put it down except to rest. It read like a mystery novel and I credit Eichenwald with his marvelous ability to keep me engaged, turning those pages for the next unbelievable deal and/or crisis. Everyone is taken in from Washington, D. C. on down the line. Hopefully some lessons were learned by those in power as well as the rest of us.
 Great read
I read The Smartest Guys in the Room and it is factual and goes into detail regarding the transactions and deals that brought Enron down, but this book is much more entertaining in that it is written like a story. I suggest reading The Smartest Guys in the Room 1st and then read this book - it brings the first book to life and then buy or rent the video.
 Could have been written by Ken Lay
This was the first of three books and numerous articles I have read about the Enron catastrophe. This one seems to take great pains to exonerate Ken Lay. Everything is someone else's fault.
There is a lot of interesting and factual information here, but most of it seems twisted to protect Ken Lay and lay all the blame on Andy Fastow. While Fastow is certainly a crook, the main problem with Enron was not the end-stage shenanigans, but the way the company was run, the way commissions and bonuses were paid for lousy deals, Enron's system of robbing California and other states of billions of dollars, that really caused the problems. Ken Lay ran Enron the way George Bush ran the US economy, and got similar results. (It didn't help that Lay/Enron was Bush's biggest financial backer since the early 1990's, either.)
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