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I loved this book...Better than his last When I saw Kurt Eichenwald had another book out, I rushed to get it. I loved The Informant, and hoped this one would be just as thrilling. It was. I literally could not put it down, which says a lot about it, since it is REALLLY long. In fact, the only criticism I have is that there is probably material that could have been cut, without hurting the story. (Full disclosure: After reading The Informant, I emailed Eichenwald with some praise, have swapped messages with him over the years and actually like him.) I finished the book last night and came online this morning to check how it was doing. What I find most interesting is the reviews attacking this book. This is really an author you need to judge based on his enemies. I saw this with The Informant, too -- a group of people obsessed with him, obsessed with The Informant, who come online and make all these ridiculous accusations about cover-ups and conspiracies. Once, they even tried to link Eichenwald to the decision to send Elian Gonzalez back to Cuba. I doubt any of them have even bothered to read Conspiracy of Fools before coming on here and raving. For all I know, it could just be one person -- but if not, it is a handful of obsessed people working together. I have seen them before. Just do a google search and you will find that their "reviews'' are just a continuation of a bizarre battle they began years ago. Anyway, so I am not big on writing reviews, but I feel like somebody needs to set the record straight: This book does not absolve Ken Lay of anything. Anyone who has read the news coverage of this case knows that Ken Lay was not charged with being involved in the partnership accounting fraud, but with lying about the financial state of the company in the months before it went under. Those events are portrayed in the book. Imagined events that have not led to criminal charges are not. If people think Lay did more than appears in this book, then they have an important argument with the government. (In fact, as proof these people don't read before they criticize, I have just read the consolidated complaint they keep referring to as telling the true story. The facts behind every allegation contained in that complaint about Lay are portrayed in this book. Sheesh.) Second, those who argue it is fiction clearly have not read the unbelievable endnotes. Eichenwald has somehow obtained records from the investigation, as well as numerous documents that are shocking to read about. Most important, it is a great read. Since one of the obsessed people saw fit to publish bits and pieces of a column from the Washington Post (which I have since checked -- he leaves out all the good stuff), I will post that paper's actual review, which ran this morning. And, unlike this other bunch, I will leave nothing out. Washington Post review by Barbara Ley Toffler Conspiracy of Fools is a rollercoaster of a read whose style mirrors the wild ride of the Enron debacle it chronicles. The result is a dynamic blend of the inevitability of a Shakespearean tragedy and the cliff-hanging breathlessness of "The Perils of Pauline": You know what the terrible ending will be, but each time you must put the book down, you can't wait to get back to it to see what the next installment will bring. Kurt Eichenwald, a New York Times reporter, presents a detailed and carefully researched chronology of the Enron story in short vignettes composed of short sentences that leave the reader's heart racing. The book barrels through the structuring of the childishly named special-purpose entities (JEDI, CHEWCO, BRAVEHEART), the manipulation of top investment banks, the feeding and entertainment of the board of directors, and the luxurious flights on the corporate jets (one of which carried former President Bush and his wife, Barbara, along with CEO Kenneth Lay, to George W.'s inauguration). Conspiracy of Fools vividly depicts the incompetence, arrogance and self-delusion of once-vaunted Enron executives who turned out to be hear-no-evil, see-no-evil, speak-no-evil dupes making bad business decisions and blindly following a diabolical Pied Piper's promises of wealth and fame to their own destruction -- and to the devastation of the many who depended on them. Eichenwald makes the characters spring to life. Lay's behavior gives new meaning to the term "sleeping your way to the top." In contrast to the usual connotation of this phrase -- which at least implies some goal-oriented activity -- Enron's CEO appears to have dozed through years of whirlwind activity. Although Lay was often clueless as to what his company was doing, he rarely questioned, never challenged and seemed to feel that whatever Jeffrey Skilling and Andrew Fastow did was fine with him. Jeffrey Skilling, Lay's successor, appears to have been severely psychologically damaged. That impression lasts throughout the book, in no small part because Eichenwald introduces him lying curled in the fetal position on a Miami hotel bed, drunk and sobbing. But the most horrifying portrait is that of Fastow -- a modern-day Richard III who ruthlessly pursued what he desired and destroyed anyone who stood in his way. If you've ever wondered how evil can overpower institutions, read Eichenwald's descriptions of Fastow's manipulations of two major investment banks, Merrill Lynch and Salomon Smith Barney. In both cases, analysts had cut their ratings on Enron and failed to support the general hoopla in the financial community about the company. With surgical precision, Fastow cut each bank out of a hot investment opportunity, baldly stating, "Our decision here is intended to send you guys a message about how viscerally we feel." The message? Questioning Enron will cost you business. The two investment houses meekly fired the offending analysts, replaced them with Enron cheerleaders and waited for Fastow to pat their heads and feed them a treat. And he did. Merrill Lynch and Salomon Smith Barney could once again pour money into Fastow's financial schemes. Eichenwald does not tell us how to prevent an Enron-like catastrophe from happening again. He calls the ultimate cause of the debacle "a nation's folly -- a folly that in time we are all but certain to see again." But his powerful story suggests a deep and compelling reason for the tragedy of Enron: the loss, by far too many of us, of the love for the work we do. Our corporations must have leaders who are not only, at a bare minimum, awake and alert and knowledgeable. Those leaders must also love the work they and their companies are engaged in, and they must care about the people whom that work affects. The leaders of Enron were not excited by the businesses they were in. They didn't love the oil patch, the pipelines, the "boring" utility companies that brought warmth and light to ordinary people. They didn't care about the community of Dabhol, India, where they built a power plant. The people of California were not there to be served, only to be pawns in a clever chess match. And respect for employees? A comment at the performance review of a long-term employee who bought liability insurance for Enron says it all: "Buy insurance? A monkey could do that!" As Eichenwald makes grippingly clear, Enron's leaders were obsessed with the deals -- the deals that brought money and the good life (though by the end, even deal-making had lost its glitter). There was no pride in the job or joy in the work of the company. Years ago, I interviewed the janitor of a graduate-student dormitory about his job. Monotonous, dirty, lonely were the words that I expected to hear. But no; this janitor said, "The people who live here, they depend on me. I can't let them down. And when I polish that floor, and it shines back at me, I know I've done a good job." Eichenwald has masterfully depicted the devastating results of that lost love of purposeful work. He also has given us a fine example of what love of the job can produce: a dynamite book. Kurt Eichenwald clearly loves what he does. * Barbara Ley Toffler, a former Harvard Business School professor, is the author of "Final Accounting: Ambition, Greed, and the Fall of Arthur Andersen."