The tsunami of cheap credit that rolled across the
planet between 2002 and 2008 was more than a simple financial phenomenon: it was
temptation, offering entire societies the chance to reveal aspects of their characters
they could not normally afford to indulge.
Icelanders wanted to stop fishing and become
investment bankers. The Greeks wanted to turn their country into a pinata stuffed with
cash and allow as many citizens as possible to take a whack at it. The Germans wanted to
be even more German; the Irish wanted to stop being Irish.
Michael Lewis's investigation of bubbles
beyond our shores is so brilliantly, sadly hilarious that it leads the American reader to
a comfortable complacency: oh, those foolish foreigners. But when he turns a merciless eye
on California and Washington, DC, we see that the narrative is a trap baited with humor,
and we understand the reckoning that awaits the greatest and greediest of debtor nations.
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Michael Lewis<>
Financial journalist and bestselling author Michael Lewis is best known for intriguing
nonfiction narratives like Liar's Poker, The
New New Thing, and Moneyball.
224 pages, Hardcover