24 Days: How Two Wall Street Journal Reporters Uncovered the Lies that Destroyed Faith in Corporate America (Hardcover)

by Rebecca Smith (Author), John R. Emshwiller (Author) "Some days, the newspaper Gods refuse to smile..." (more)
Key Phrases: billion equity reduction, equity hit, earnings story, New York, Wall Street, Los Angeles (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"[A] chronicle of greed run wild." (Denver Post )

"A good story that goes well beyond the common narrative of a company of excess" (Houston Chronicle )

"A gripping first-person narrative." (Fast Company )

"Gripping...24 Days is a fast-paced, enjoyable read and the best of the Enron books yet." (USA Today )

a page-turner...a riveting behind-the-scenes look at investigative reporting at its highest level (Forbes.com )

Even though 24 Days has the feel of a true crime book, the business lessons within it are eye-opening. (Jack Covert, 1-800-CEO-READ )

"A fascinating tale that reveals as much about the journalistic process as about Enron." (Washington Post )

"Featuring unnamed sources, conflicts with editors and angry phone calls with Enron staffers..Think All the President's Men." (Associated Press )

Product Description

This is the story of two Wall Street Journal beat reporters -- one covering the energy industry just after the chaotic California electricity crisis; the other chasing stock swindlers. Together these journalists were ideally placed to uncover one of the great cons of the century. Here is a story about the fall of a great company, and the practice of journalism, marked by skill, luck, and determination.

24 Days is the gripping, untold chronicle of the investigative process -- often haphazard but imbued with insight and commitment -- that broke through Enron's stonewalling and exposed its inner workings, setting in motion a chain of events that shook the public's trust in big business, Wall Street, and the accounting profession.

In August 2001, Jeffrey Skilling unexpectedly resigned from his job as CEO of Enron after only six months in the top job. While Smith -- who had been covering the California energy crisis -- was away, the Wall Street Journal Los Angeles bureau chief drafted Emshwiller to interview Skilling. During a rambling conversation, Emshwiller stumbles onto an unlikely admission from the corporate prodigy, which partly confirms the journalists' suspicions that Skilling didn't quit for "personal reasons." This odd revelation raised ominous questions about Enron's much-bragged-about success.

The two reporters pick and pull at the mystery, and with the help of confidential sources, who understood Enron's inner workings, expose an audacious scheme: Andrew Fastow's off-balance-sheet partnerships that hid Enron's failings and inflated its value by billions of dollars. Refusing to be put off by Enron's arrogant dismissal of anyone who questioned the company's practices, Smith and Emshwiller relied on their instincts and common sense to shine a light into Enron's "black box" finances.

Climaxing in the brief period after Enron released disastrous earnings in October 2001, 24 Days gives a reporter's-eye view of the tug-of-war between journalists and a giant corporation. Each day, a new story uncovered another fact. Each day, the company issued denials. When the doubts and questions reached critical mass and momentum, the stock market cast its final vote of no confidence.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: HarperBusiness (August 5, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060520736
• ISBN-13: 978-0060520731
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #948,651 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Terrific reporting on an important story, September 8, 2003

By	Craig Matteson (Ann Arbor, MI) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

This is a terrific book. It should be read by anyone who invests because it will give you a better understanding of not only the Enron case, but of the problem of corrupt executives playing fast and loose with their responsibilities to the investors who employ them. Remember, the investors own the company, not the executives. They are hired help who are supposed to look after the interests of those who have put up hard cash for stock in the corporation and who are taking the financial risk as residual claimants. (Of course, those taking risks include the employees who probably have retirement investments in the company). It is a lively read and provides a great deal of valuable information along with the intrigue and outrageous revelations.

There are three story lines that flow like counterpoint. I found them riveting, but I enjoy reading about business. (You probably do as well, or why are you reading about this book?)

First, we follow Rebecca Smith and John Emshwiller as they track down leads in developing news stories about the sudden resignation of Enron's young CEO, Jeff Skilling. This seemingly minor story develops into the amazing and unexpected collapse of Enron as its corrupt financial dealings and improper accounting practices are exposed. We also follow the race between the authors as reporters for the Wall Street Journal racing against the New York Times, the LA Times, and the national TV news programs to get the story out first.

Second, we get the story of Enron and how Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling, and especially Andy Fastow worked hard to keep the true state of the company hidden from investors and regulators. We see how they drew others into their plans and punished those who wouldn't go along. The story makes clear how Andersen was brought down by an account team that allowed their lust for tens of millions of dollars in consulting fees to corrupt their accounting responsibilities.

Third, we see how both the climb and collapse of Enron affected average and honest people just trying to do their jobs. It was easy to get caught up in the rise of Enron and to believe in what was going on because the sickeningly corrupt practices were kept hidden for so long. Some of these executives, who reaped untold millions in personal rewards, might argue that everything was disclosed as required by letter of the regulations. But it seems to me that it was all just a way of lying while going to the right up to the edge of violating the letter of the law and then slipping over. Enron and Andersen management ended up not being as slick as they thought and ended up destroying both companies and hurting tens of thousands of innocent folks.

Another virtue of this books is that it is straight reporting. Rather than being advocacy journalism, it reports the facts of the case as they unfolded. I like this approach a great deal and think it strengthens the message of the book. You are free to make your own interpretation of the events presented. The authors do express their own reactions to certain events and revelations, but do not draw final conclusions of guilt or innocence. Nor do they try to apportion blame, although they do report comments and judgments of others who do.

Really, I wish this book would be read widely because it would help potential investors realize the need they have to pay close attention to the management team of companies they choose to invest in. They also need to educate themselves as much as possible on the industries and accounting practices of not only the companies they invest in, but also their competitors. Such awareness can help set off the "something isn't right" detector. Unfortunately, when things appear to be going well hard questions are usually not asked and when things fall apart it is usually too late to start asking.

This is a fine book that will have a permanent place on your shelf of business books.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Insightful and Disturbing, June 22, 2004

By A Customer

24 Days reads like a John Grisham novel with the (naturally) two journalists as the protaginists sifting through the piles of obfuscation to get to the truth. Ultimately, the book shows that those who raided Enron were nothing more than common crooks, con men and money grubbing amoralists whose only interest was lining their own pockets. Sadly, justice has yet to be (if it ever will) served against many who were involved and the connections between Enron and current Administration remain woefully underreported.

What I can say is that the two journalists have done a great job of showing how the house of cards fell down. My only criticism, and it's a minor one, is that to the layperson, many of the financial terms will be hard to understand and the complex transactions that hid the billions in debt Enron had can be difficult to follow. Otherwise, this is highly recommended reading for people who want to know what crony capitalism is all about.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting book, but fails to really exploit its strength, May 9, 2004

By	brazos49 "brazos49" (Sugar Land, TX USA) - See all my reviews

This is a pretty decent book. It gives a fairly good overview of what went wrong with Enron and a fairly good look at the process the authors worked through in reporting on Enron for the Wall Street Journal. So, why don't I rate it a 5-star book? Mainly because it doesn't excel in either area. As an Enron story, it's far less revealing than "The Smartest Guys in the Room". As a book about what it's like to be reporters breaking a huge story, I think it fails to convey the sense of excitement and accomplishment they must have felt. So, in my opinion, they produced a good, interesting book that fell far short of its potential.

My memory of the events unfolding around Enron's spectacular failure places The Wall Street Journal in a leading role in terms of pressuring the company to start to be more forthcoming in its public dealings. Surely there was a lot of intrigue and tension involved with being the reporters driving this story. But this book doesn't really give the reader a feeling about what that was like. Maybe it was as nearly routine as the feel of the book suggests, but I have to believe it was more gripping than that. And as far as telling the Enron failure story, this book gives a decent overview, but there are better chronicles of that story.

So, was I disappointed that I read this book? No, it was pretty good. I just felt it could have been a lot more. I think I'm coming to the conclusion that writers for periodicals don't tend to write the best books. They're good at "just the facts, Ma'am" storytelling, but to deliver a really outstanding book, a writer has to be able to use the larger canvas to paint pictures that he can place the reader in. These authors don't do that and, I'd say that unless you're pretty interested in the Enron story, you could skip this one.