Customer Reviews

Bombardiers

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

"Bombardiers" is manic and funny.

Po Bronson's novel about bond traders is a candid look into the "greasemen" of the financial system. It tells the story of a dysfunctional SF bond trading office. The office is a corporate meatgrinder churning out profits, making those crazy or tough enough to handle the stress rich, and crushing the rest. In the pressure cooker of the bond market, "when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro". If you're not a pro, you're fired. One day, a new salesman Eggs Igino fresh out of grad school arrives. He's like Jesus, and he changes everything.

This book was so good, I read it in two days. At one point I had to put it down because I was laughing so hard tears were running down my cheeks. Bronson's prose is this weird melange of Joseph Heller and Hunter S. Thompson (in his early years). It's the ridiculous, mixed with base human emotions, and salted with the bizarre.

While hilarious, Bronson's plot is a bit weak. He appears to be an author who derives more from the setting then the story. I had trouble sorting out the main character's (Igino) motives. Or maybe the main character was Sid Geeder? I couldn't be sure. In addition, his two female character's (Lisa Lisa and Sue Marino) were interchangeable.

"Bombardiers" is a good read. It's got information, sex, absurdity, and cruel humor administered at an amphetamine charged pace. You won't put it down.

Very fun and nasty satire of brokerage houses written by a briefly former insider. It's more of a fictional sociological study of the men and few women bond brokers of a San Francisco brokerage house. Standard types are presented, along with the motivations that drive them, and the lies by which they unload dubious securities. In all this Bronson is really going after the entire system which allows firms to profit massively from insane schemes and financial failures. Everything goes wacky at Atlantic Pacific when a new, young salesman appears on the floor. He ignores the rules, has the nature of a master salesman, and throws the system in a tizzy. It's all pretty over the top, but fun stuff with more than a kernel of truth.

I taught a business finance class this Spring and offered my students extra-credit for reading this book. My purpose was for them to learn more about finance while being entertained. This book is so funny that I shared it with friends (physics grad students) who loved it as much as I do.

Po's story about the world of investing kept me entertained. The characters are engaging and the prose, although not jumping off the page, is good. Bombardiers is readable, there's just one problem: Catch 22's been done already. This novel is a complete hack from motif right down to the loopy dialogue. pass.

I've read all of Bronson's books. Unlike earlier reviewers, I'm still partial to his fiction, and of the two books he's put out there, "Bombardiers" (vs. "The First $20 Million...") is by far the better work.

Yes, it's funny, it's biting, it has that "Catch 22" thing going on...but it's also *very* educational. Bronson really understands markets and does a great job here getting their complexities down on paper in an engaging, even riveting, way - even when it involves something as trivial as the office breakfast.

Very humorous and very highly recommended.

Unputdownable and laugh out loud funny, I read this book in a day and a half. Unlike Liar's Poker, there's no attempt to explain the bonds being traded, instead Bronson seems convinced that not even the market participants really understand them and focuses on having some fun, and quickly!

The sales managers are ogres, the bond salesmen themselves tortured heroes, or bastards, or idiots, or sometimes a combination of 2 or 3 of those, with some telepathic or clairvoyant skills thrown in if it will make things move along quicker. Revenge is sweet, and consumed often, served hot or cold. Stress nearly kills several characters, and ruins the life of many more. Relationships are as short and destructive as possible. But it's "cartoon violence" and the whole way the jokes keep coming thick and fast, and you're laughing so much that people are starting to ask what the hell you're reading!

It's a wild ride, and hard to get off once you're on board. Read it!

Po Bronson's book is a clever satirization of life on a bond sales desk. Having been on a trading floor, I found that the antics and brutally competitive environment depicted by Bronson were wonderfully authentic. Bronson also does a great job in explaining esoteric market concepts well. I know the challenge of accomplishing that from writing my work on the finance world: "Imposters at the Gate: A Novel about Private Equity". The uproarious humor and ease of use of language make it a great read!

It was a filthy profession, but the money was addicting and one addiction led to another... and so the novel begins and takes you on a journey into the absurd world of high finance, where the stakes are high, the traders are insane, the institutional customers are glory-hungry hacks, and the money become the grease that that keeps its bizzare machine humming at breakneck velocity.

Bronsonsuccesfully takes the most absurd elements of high finance and weaves it into a cautionary tale of the price the new information economy extracts from its front-line foot soldiers. Sid's sales pitch of the Lincoln Convertible Bonds to a hapless fund manager alone is worth the price of the book -- where he browbeats and ridicules a timid portfolio manager into taking a $5 million position in a bond designed to finance the hostile takeover of a small ... country. Blisteringly hilarious, and darkly cynical it's the sort of work that good satirists should aspire to.

Outrageous and fun for thosein the industry ... and a fair warning for ambitious college students wanting a shot at the glory in the capital of capitalism of investment banking.

This hysterical first novel does for the financial world what Catch-22 did for world war II. This book is so good it's addictive; I had to read it twice. Although the characters are reminiscent of those seen in "Liar's Poker" and the humor is similar to Catch-22, it is not at all predictable. One warning - you may never be able to believe your stockbroker again. Fortunately, Po Bronson has rewarded us with a second novel taking aim at the computer industry. I wonder who's next

There is no better book that shares the hypocrasies and truisms investment banking than Bronson's book. Having worked in this industry for a number of years, I can attest that there is far more in this book that is true than fiction - as hard as it might seem for someone not affiliated with this industry to grasp. Unfortunately, only insiders will appreciate how revealing this book is because there is so much that will whiz over the average readers head. Much of this, to the average reader, is pure silliness and fun. But it's not so.