Customer Reviews

The Murder of Lehman Brothers: An Insider's Look at the Global Meltdown

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I am a retired college professor. Like most Americans, I am not expert in finance and economics. Fortunately my retirement savings are conservatively invested, and so I did not suffer life-changing losses after Lehman filed for bankruptcy protection, but I know many who did. Like many, I found myself anxious to understand what had happened to cause such hardship for so many people. I have never before written an Amazon review, but am inspired to do so now because reading "The Murder of Lehman Brothers" profoundly transformed and deepened my understanding of the financial crisis. As a former educator I am immensely impressed by this book. It explains the financial crisis for a reader who is not an economist or a financial professional. At the same time, like the most enjoyable of books, I could not put this down. I was hooked as soon as I read the prologue.

I am not generally a reader of business books. However, because the financial crisis has so deeply affected out country, I wanted to understand its causes. While I knew the crisis could not be solely blamed on Lehman Brothers, I thought a Lehman book would explain what happened at that investment bank in a larger context. I saw Lawrence McDonald's "Colossal Failure of Common Sense," a book by a former Lehman employee, on the New York Times bestseller list and decide to give it a try. The book was a highly readable disappointment. It did in fact simplistically blame the Lehman failure on a handful of Lehman executives, and did so with considerable anger. It is a given that large global events are rarely so easily explained.

Several weeks later I came across Joseph Tibman's book. To be honest, the dramatic title was initially a turn-off. I expected the book to be mainstream pulp by a greedy investment banker seeking to cash in on the crisis. However, as I flipped through the book, I could see that this was actually something very different. There were chapters devoted to the causes of the crisis. Also, I noticed that there were a substantial number of footnotes on many of the pages. These explain financial terms and concepts so that a reader like me can more thoroughly understand what happened.

most importantly, this book enables its readers to understand events that were previously too technical to grasp. At the same time this is by no means a textbook. In fact the prologue and ther passages read like a novel. What Tibman accomplished is a neat trick that, as a published professor, I know is extraordinarily difficult. He has written a book one "cannot put down,' a page-turner that also teaches. After completing "The Murder of Lehman," I found myself explaining the financial crisis to friends. To my great surprise, when they challenged my reasoning, I was able to substantively respond. It was only then that I realized that the book subtly allowed me to form my own view of certain events open to interpretation. While Tibman has many strong views and an ability to communicate his incites, not everything in "The Murder of Lehman Brothers" is presented as black ans white. This is one of the books accomplishments. It does not pretend to have all of the answers. As is always the case with events of this magoitude, years hence historians will disagree about this financial meltdown.

The Murder of Lehman Brothers begins with an excellent prologue that reads like a novel. It was this that initially hooked me, and led me to explore further. The first chapter is summarized history of the firm. While I read it, there were interesting passages that may not be similarly appreciated by younger readers -- the firm financed industries that were a backdrop to many years of my life. At the same time, this is a chapter for all to read carefully. I found myself, flipping back to it. Much that occurred years ago formed a basis for, or at least foreshadowed, what would later happen to the firm. This larger context always exists, but in books of this type (non-fiction that is has many elements of a memooir) is often absent. The next chapter, on the aftermath of 9/11 at Lehman is the most emotional chapter. It is here that you see Tibman's passion for Lehman Brothers most poignantly expressed. Tibman also had the good sense to forego gruesome descriptions of the 9/11 assault. Instead you hear a very American tale of people subsequently coming together under adversity. It was also, in reading this chapter, that as a lifelong liberal Democrat I viewed investment bankers as people rather tha greed driven tacit criminals operating within laws they had lobbied for in Washington.

From this point forward the author begins to explain the roots of the financial crisis, skillfully weaving this into his narrative. The tender feelings for Lehman investment bankers and traders in the 9/11 chapter were mitigated by the questionable ethics among many in the financial world that are later described. Of course, this is as it should be. Little in this book is presented as black and white. Consistent with this, while the author clearly lays a great deal of blame for the current economic crisis at the feet of politicians and regulators in Washington, he does not pick sides. Given my own political views, I was initially unhappy and disappointed that Tibman was outspoken about failings of the Clinton administration. I told myself that after all he was turning out to be a typical Wall Street Republican. But then, tt wasn't long before I saw Tibman equally criticize Republicans. A positive of this book is that in the tradition of journalism I was unable to discern Tibman's political leanings. It is, however, apparent that he views few in Washington as up to the job of regulating the financial sector.

Much of the balance of the book explains the unfolding crisis at Lehman. While Tibman doesn't interupt this with calls for change, it is difficult to see how anyone, Republican, Democrat or Independent, could come away from this book without realizing that economic recovery by itself is not a fix for all that is wrong in Washington and financial markets. While Tibman does not preach, it is clear that he intends this book in part as a call to arms. In fact he quotes from the film "Network" a scene where a newscaster encourages his viewers to open their windows and shout, "Im mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore."

While there is even more to praise than that which I have covered in this review, in the interest of balance I will point out the few shortcomings of the book. As mentioned above, it is part narrative and therefore, by definition, is not without indulgence. Of course, it is also the personal aspect of the book that makes it so compelling. I'm not sure this could be avoided by any insider writing such a book, but it is an imperfection. Additionally, in a chapter or two, while explaining many of the causes of the financial crisis, Tibman moves back and forth in time. This did not derail me, but a discussion of events in perfect chronological order could have made for a somewhat smoother read.

These are minor complaints. I have been lending the book to friends and I recommend it to everyone who can read. I suppose the book may reveal less to many on Wall Street than to the rest of us. Still, the book makes clear that Wall Street must change. It could do no harm for financial professionals who shoulder a substantial portion of the blame for what has happened to our country to hear from one among them this outcry. To Tibman's credit (perhaps facilitated by writing under a pseudonym) he makes no excuses for his own place in an industry where ethics are not a consideration. Such admissions are uncommon.

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I am not really sure where to start in reviewing Joseph Tibman's new book, The Murder of Lehman Brothers. Like the preceding book on Lehman's extraordinary fall (see my review of A Collosal Failure of Common Sense here), there is plenty of riveting stuff here, especially if read as a narrative. I should start my review by informing readers that we do not know who the author is. Joseph Tibman is an alias (shorthand for "The Investment Bank Man"), as the author has chosen to write anonymously so as to preserve opportunities in the investment banking world. The author writes as an "inside investment banker" at Lehman Brothers, and unfortunately, lacking an identification of the author or validation of his credentials, it is difficult to evaluate what kind of "inside" look at the self-destruction of Lehman we are getting. Lawrence McDonald was a regular bond trader at the firm who admitted to having never met CEO Richard Fuld. "Tibman" was not a trader but rather a banker, and he does provide an interesting look at the firm's post-9/11 inertia which makes for enjoyable reading. He also gratefully skips much of the personal biographical component that I believe hindered the drama of McDonald's book (no offense, but I doubt readers were buying either of these books for the childhood tales of people they have never heard of). So I commend this book in the sense that it is an interesting read on some of the events that transpired at Lehman Brothers. Unfortunately, some other elements to it require undressing.The narrative of this story, as compelling as it is on its own, is hindered by many of the ideological flaws that surround the telling of the narrative. I will address these in no particular order.

(1) The incessant theme that many Lehmanites have had that "if the shoe were on Goldman's foot, the government would have bailed them out", is tired and frankly absurd. It misses the only point that needs to be made about this entire mess: It wasn't Goldman Sachs who blew themselves into smithereens. Envy of Goldman's superior performance to their competitors is certainly forgivable, for human nature has not been transcended, but rank speculation about what "woulda coulda" been based on Paulson's past relationship with Goldman Sachs is both unattractive and contrary to common sense wisdom. In the weeks after Lehman's collapse when the global crisis of confidence did land on Goldman's doorstep, the treasury department actually refused to extend to Goldman the backing of a deal with Wachovia, a decision Warren Buffett deemed "inevitable" based on the political appearance of it. So no, I do not believe the treasury department would have bailed out Goldman Sachs on September 12, but far more importantly, they didn't need to. Goldman hedged their subprime exposure; Lehman tripled down on it like an alcoholic in the midst of a bender trying to suck down the last sip he can find in the mini-bar. Goldman has reported one negative quarter in the last century; Lehman's collateral, equity, and free cash flows were not in the same stratosphere as Lehman's. I am not trying to play the grand apologist for Goldman Sachs, though I have far more complimentary things to say than I do negative. But I find Tibman's tantrum about the treatment Lehman got relative to the treatment he thinks Goldman would have received to be a real detractor to the book.

(2) I am not sure what could have possibly driven Tibman to pepper the book with [very unconstructive] pot shots at George W. Bush. If these shots had been speciifc to policy errors that were relevant to the financial crisis, or Lehman in particular, I would be more sympathetic. But the shots reak to me of rank political pandering. He is an easy target, of course, but it is demeaning to the readers of the book. Does Tibman criticize Bush's housing policies? Of course not - Bush simply carried on the idiotic mandate of Carter's CRA and Clinton's Fannie-Maeism. Does he criticize Bush's spending? No. And at this point, as horrific as Bush's spending was, hasn't it been positively dwarfed by the new administration? So as far as his role in the financial crisis is concerned, I don't see where Tibman draws any lines of interest. Instead, he lets us know in a not-so-subtle way that he was opposed to the Iraq war, and he thinks Bush is really stupid. Editor, where art thou?

(3) I have to spend the bulk of my time in this review focused on the major flaw of this book, and that is the way Tibman handles his disgust that Lehman was not bailed out by the federal government. My treatment of this financial crisis (through the three dozen book reviews I am writing and my own subsequent treatment of the subject) will have to deal with how Uncle Sam handled Lehman Brothers. And believe it or not, even a deep free market ideologue like me believes that there is room for discussion on what the government could have done differently here. But Tibman's treatment of this subject is so off base, it warrants dramatic correction.

Suffice it to say, Tibman, a paid employee of Lehman Brothers who is no longer working in investment banking (for now), believes that if Uncle Sam had simply agreed to cough up $50-65 billion on that fateful weekend in September of 2008, the entire crisis would have been averted. Lehman would have found a partner. The credit markets would not have collapsed. "Through time" (no one ever provides detail on how time would have solved the utter insolvency of a dysfunctional organization) confidence would have been restored, a new partner would have repaired the impairments, and all would be well in the world. Not only was this outcome achievable to Tibman (it was not), but it was morally imperative (and it certainly was not that either). To Tibman, the fact that Bear Stearns got the deal they got in March made it a requirement that Lehman get something similar. He also appeals to the Fannie and Freddie bailouts of the week prior, as well as the AIG bailout just two days after the Lehman bankruptcy as a basis for his claim of injustice (all prima facie acceptable claims). He holds back nothing in tearing Henry Paulson to pieces, insulting his intelligence, his character, and most bizarrely, his "strict ideology." So here I go ...

Hank Paulson was no "rigid free market ideologue", and to suggest so is simply incomprehensible. Paulson was the author of the TARP bill, and perhaps the most moderate member of Bush's cabinet. It is quite ironic that the only people who criticize Paulson for his "excessive laissez-faire economics" are those that seem to think government bailouts of everyone and anyone is the desired policy of choice. The vast majority of the criticism of Paulson comes from laissez faire folks who are offended by his interventions in the market. It can't be both ways. But let's look at these bailouts, one by one.

Bear Stearns was not bailed out by the Treasury Department. In fact, Paulson refused to. The Federal Reserve intervened, appealing to their "exigant circumstances" clause of the 1920's that gave them legal right to. They did so by backing the assets that JP Morgan would be buying. JP Morgan took on the first $1 billion of risk, and the Federal Reserve the next $29 billion. Time will tell how this works out for the investment bank. The reality is that this intervention appears to me to be what gave the powers that be at Lehman Brothers the false belief that they could stubbornly refuse to de-lever this bloated balance sheet, play truth-or-dare with their write-downs, and avoid taking on the outside partner they desperately needed. So yes, moral hazard did run amok. To mock the idea that moral hazard was a concern (or worse, to mock the idea that it should have been a concern is unacceptable.

Fannie and Freddie are the most expensive bailouts the taxpayers have taken on, and the errors of this mess can hardly be put at the feet of Hank Paulson. For all he has done wrong, he did not charter this massive monument to failed government social policy. He did not resist the aggressive efforts of others in the Bush administration to rein in their irresponsible leverage ratios. Barney Frank and two generations of congressional leftists had deified Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and more specfically, told their creditors that these were "government sponsored enterprises", giving an absolutely implicit guarantee that the government was backing the debt of these bloated pigs. All Paulson did was take over these entities that the govenrnment had spent forty years saying they would back if things ever got bad enough. Well, guess what: they got bad enough. PIMCO's bond book got written up like no trading gain in American history, the equity got wiped, and if anything, Paulson was harshly criticized for letting the preferred equity get wiped that so many banks were holding on their balance sheets. A real market ideologue like me may hate the fact that Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac ever existed, but even I have to acknowledge the legal responsibility the Treasury had to these "government sponsored enterprises." Again, to Tibman, if they bailed out Fannie they should have bailed out Lehman. It is a dubious assertion.

Then there is the sickening bailout of AIG. The argument at the time was that Lehman lacked sufficient collateral to extend financial help to (an incontestable claim), yet that AIG held adequate assets to back the loan (now known to be totally false). The taxpayers are going to re-claim most of the money extended to AIG at some point in time, I think. They will never be made whole. And this is unacceptable. But at the very least, I am hard-pressed to see why the conclusion is not "two wrongs do not make a right." Tibman never explains why one firm getting wrongly bailed out means that every firm who poses systemic trouble ought to be bailed out. I am not even suggesting that there is no argument for some different handling of the Lehman situation, but I certainly am arguing that just because Lehman was in trouble, Uncle Sam is not morally obliged to intervene. Tibman never, ever tells us why Lehman warranted special treatment. In fact, he makes the case as clear as can be (accidentally) why they did not deserve it.

Pages and pages of the book (and historical annals which verify this) are dedicated to documenting how fervently Hank Paulson (and others) advised Richard Fuld to find a partner for Lehman Brothers. Treasury can hardly be faulted for spending six months telling Lehman Brothers to go learn how to fish, but then refusing to give them a fish for free six months later when they refused to go take one single lesson. Lehman did earn the wrath of Paulson's treasury, and they did so all on their own. The week after Bear Stearns went under, Lehman Brothers had ample options (highly lucrative ones) for a sale, a partnership, a capital infusion, etc. As Tibman himself pointed out, Fuld's response to the skeptics and doubters of Lehman's solvency was to buy back their own stock with their depleting capital just to spite short sellers. This is unimaginable in hindsight, but it was equally unimaginable when it was happening. It was first class insanity. And to Tibman, it does nothing to negate this alleged "obligation" of the taxpayers to come to the rescue. I beg to differ.

I really could have skipped everything I have said so far, though, to make this major point. The passionate claim from Tibman that Lehman was "murdered" because they did not get taxpayer money is essentially based on the biggest misnomer of this crisis, and that is that Lehman was dealing with a mere liquidity crisis, and not an extraordinary crisis of solvency. No "bridge loan" would have pulled them through, and the history books are going to be utterly clear about this. Tibman and even myself can be as critical as we want about subsequent bills like TARP, but at the end of the day, the so-called "Wall Street bailout" was really a "depositor bailout", as Uncle Sam poured money into the system deemed necessary to keep customers of banks from losing their [highly leveraged] deposits and investments. Lehman did not fit into this category. They had blown up their own principal accounts, and done so with an arrogance and stupidity that is never going to be explained in the ash heap of history that Lehman now sits in. My own belief is that Tibman is right that Paulson and his crew did underestimate what the collateral damage would be to Lehman's failure, and the events of September and October of 2008 played those things out. However, a lack of foresight as to how something was going to play out does not negate the fact that it was going to need to play itself out. The recklessness of the 2003-2007 period on Wall Street had come to a day of reckoning, and if Uncle Sam had bailed out Lehman, it just would have been someone else, probably posing far greater systemic risk, standing in line. Do we have a precedent here? How did that General Motors deal in Detroit work out? Did $25 billion of infused capital help avert their bankruptcy? What about the next batch of $8 billion? No, in fact, it made it all worse. Insolvent companies are insolvent companies. And we can (and should) talk about inconsistency in application, but the idea that Jim Cramer and Joe Tibman and others are putting forward: that if Uncle Sam had merely floated Lehman $60 billion all would have been fine in the world, totally ignores the trillion dollar debacle we were facing. I recognize that is now incumbent upon me to have an additional conversation about their subsequent actions with Citi and Bank of America, and I intend to do so (critically). At some point, my preference is for the entire conversation to revert to what Uncle Sam did wrong from 1969-2007 that caused the situation which necessitated much of the 2008-2009 response, but I digress. My point right now is simply this: the crisis in the world credit markets brought about by the Lehman bankruptcy of 2008 could have been handled better, and arguments can be made for a different policy reaction, but to use hindsight to say that Paulson was a blind ideologue forcing a capitalist mantra down our throat is pure revisionist history, and exposes a flawed view of the government's relationship with its citizens.

It is imperative that I clarify one very important thing: It does not matter how critical I am of Lehman's management, of Lehman's risk policies (or lack thereof), and how truly pathological I find the behavior of their senior management to have been from 2004-2008, the fall of Lehman Brothers was and is an unspeakable human tragedy. Mr. Tibman and others like him are victims, not culprits, in this disaster. The damage done to the capital markets was tragic enough, but what happened to the employees, shareholders, creditors, and trading partners of Lehman on a purely human level is just unfathomable. Nothing I have said herein negates this.

Tibman has written an informative book that I am glad I read. Unfortunately, my disagreements with its major conclusion force me to suggest a different title. The Suicide of Lehman Brothers would be far more appropriate.

This is a good book. Not a great book. For folks without a financial background but with an intellectual curiosity, it puts into perspective the elements of a perfect storm that culminated in the LB disaster. It's great to have the different blamable forces called out - to see how past Presidents helped create the fiasco, how government agencies lived up to the levels of incompetence we always feared they had (but prayed they didn't), how the Fed (wizards?) black magic stirred the pot that would become the maelstrom, how a culture of Kool-Aid drinking savage money addicts (i.e.the Street folks) deluded themselves, and how everyday people who desperately wanted the 'American Dream' let themselves feast on the pile of crap that was mounding before them. Let's not forget Fuld and Gregory - they deserve an ineffable amount of blame. I'm going to have a hard time trusting investment banks after this. But then we should have guessed. When it's too good to be true, it ain't. You never get something for nothing. Fool me once ... let's not go there (I'll leave that to W). It will all happen again. The system is BROKEN ... The book rings all too true. But it is tedious in places (I could have been spared pages and pages of company history and internal politics - maybe Street people will enjoy the details). There's no way this book could have been written by someone who had only a few short years at the company. It has a depth that makes it convincing, it's not only well researched, it's told from a perspective that is the essence of what makes this book recommendable - it's told from the perspective that 'it's personal'. There are expletives here and there ... after reading it ... not nearly enough!

This book is poorly written, repetitive, superficial, and laced with needless profanity and F-words. The prose resembles a high school student's writing, and I am surprised others rate it highly.

The only merits are the descriptions of Lehman Brothers' history, investment bankers' obsession with annual bonuses, and the anxiety inside a dying firm. If you're interested in a banker's opinion of how lawmakers and regulators should avoid future bubbles and melt-downs, forget it.

This book is really just water cooler gossip interspaced with chronological headlines. Most of the author's opinions about what CEO Fuld and other executives were thinking are sourced from staff meetings, management announcements to employees, and some hearsay. In other words, the author was an ordinary employee without first hand knowledge of management's thinking.

I hoped to learn why Masters of the Universe were so confident in subprime lending/securitization, why their trusted models failed, and why this premier bank botched its asset valuations so badly a fatal run ensued. The author repeatedly mentions short sellers, but never explains what short sellers saw that made them confident to risk their capital to bet against Lehman, while the author himself admits ignorance of Lehman's balance sheet. The author makes, but fails to explain, an amazing assertion that Lehman bought a quantity of Alt-A mortgages in 2008. Obviously, it was a mistake to buy Alt-A mortgages 18 months after the subprime melt-down commenced: but what were they thinking? Was Lehman buying "safe" senior tranches it considered oversold and undervalued? Sadly, the author cannot answer such questions because he never worked in the departments that created "toxic" assets, and he probably does not know the difference in a Super Senior tranche and an IO Strip. (Read James Grant's "Mr. Market Miscalculates" if you want to know how and why the melt-down happened). Instead of explaining why investment banks trusted their models and made catastrophic blunders, the author merely recites the worn out cliché "we drank the Kool-Aid" at least 100 times. Even the politicians know that much.

In case you have not heard the name Joseph Tibman it is probably because this book was written anonymously. The author claims that he does not want his career in finance to be jeopardized by revealing his identity. What we do know however is that the author was a senior investment banker at the firm. He was at the firm at least since the IPO of Lehman in 1994.
The book starts with a brief early history of the firm and quickly gets to the 1990s where the first problems in mortgage practices started. The author faults several actions of the Clinton administration policies on housing, mortgages, and financial policy. These policies grew worse in the Bush administration when many actions or inactions exacerbated the problem. I thought overall the author was fair in his criticism of the Government's role in the demise of the financial system, without having a partisan bend towards either party. Besides for the beginning being mostly interesting overview of Lehman's history, it contained much detail Dick Fuld's risk taking traits that would decades later prove fatal to the firm. The book also explains how Lehman went from becoming a small investment bank, to one of the most prestigious banks on Wall Street. Despite the authors obvious (and justified) dislike of Dick Fuld he was fair in crediting Fuld for much of Lehman's success up until its risky practices in the mid 2000s. He credits Dick Fuld with uniting the firms division between traders and investment bankers, with a slogan One Firm after the 9/11 attacks.
The author's premise I believe was the collapse of Lehman Brothers was due to a herd mentality. He claims that there developed in the firm a sense of the firm would survive anything as they had in the past. Interestingly the author claims that Lehman almost collapsed due to their exposure to tesobonos in 1995, and was saved due to the IMF and US government's aid to Mexico. Lehman constantly felt that "the world was out to get them", yet in the end the firm would survive. He said due to this herd mentality few questioned top management's increasing exposure to commercial real estate, subprime securitization and other risky practices. When on conference calls top Lehman executives claimed that the firm had hedged its risk, most of the employees believed it to be true. He claimed that the people at the firm were kool-aid drinkers and he was one too. While it is easier for an anonymous person to find fault in themselves, I still think it's noteworthy that the author does not try to glorify himself.
I learned some interesting, and unrelated information in the book that I had not previously known. Lehman and Bear Sterns collapse was mostly due to exposure to Alt-A mortgages, commercial real estate and only minimal exposure to subprime loans. I was also shocked to learn the Dick Fuld was a member of the board of directors of the New York Federal Reserve. I did not know this was legal, but it is obviously a conflict of interest and in fact Fuld used this role to try and help Lehman. The book also mentions the many offers that Lehman received to be bought out, and the fact that Henry Paulson was in touch with Fuld almost daily towards the end of the firm's life. Paulson was constantly trying to convince Fuld to sell the firm which he refused. The only time Fuld thought of selling the firm was at the peak of the bubble in 2000 and only at a huge premium then of 4x book value.

Overall I enjoyed the book. My main criticism is that there was not enough discussion of the detailed practices that led to Lehman's demise. I would have preferred to hear more about the technical details of Lehman's practices in commercial real estate, subprime lending, and Alt A mortgages. However, it is clear the author wanted his book to appeal to readers without a background in economics and therefore did not want to make the book too technical. I think the book still gives the reader a good understanding of the financial crisis from the perspective of a long time Lehman insider. I would recommend this book to both someone working on main street or wall street.

The Murder of Lehman Brothers is a terrific book, one that will help anyone understand the workings of Wall Street a bit better. And it's a great read.

I work in the financial services industry and have read a number of the books that have come out over the last year purporting to explain what caused the worst financial meltdown since the Great Depression. This book provided the best insight, in large part because of the authentic and honest voice of author Joseph Tibman.

Tibman is a former Lehman banker and the only true insider to tell the story of the firm's demise and explain its widespread impact. I can see why the author felt he needed to use a pen name in order to hide his identity. Only those who have worked on the Street can really understand or explain complex issues like collateralized debt obligations and the wheeling and dealing that goes on, and now Joe's revealing some of the inner-most secrets. He would not be welcomed back to Wall Street if his colleagues knew his name.

From the very first page and anecdote, Joe tells it like it is, and gives us a true idea of the thinking of investment bankers, from those at the very top to those throughout a large organization who are, at times, as confused by what's going on at their own firm as anyone on the outside.

He doesn't hide his admiration for the investment banking industry and for the Lehman Brothers that he once knew. But he is also highly critical of the culture of excess, and he makes you realize that, without a wholesale reformation of Wall Street and government regulation, these sorts of excesses are bound to happen again, no matter what the bankers or the government tell you. Nor does he pretend that he saw the whole thing coming. And he does this in a fact-filled, entertaining book that's easy to read and, at least for me, hard to put down, especially as he recounts the final days at Lehman.

It's a shame we don't know the real name of this author, for I'm looking forward to his next book.

Joe Tibman does a great job putting the reader on the 31st floor of Lehman before and during its fall. A concise book and nice to get additional insights of this tragic event.

Having followed the events closely, and knowing a lot of the actors involved, The Murder of Lehman is truly insightful and entertaining.

This book is not one of the best books about the financial crisis of 2008, but there are good things about it.

It is authored by an insider who worked at Lehman and has great knowledge of investment banking. Around page 55, he begins to discuss the complicated financial instruments that got us all into trouble: CDOs, Swaps, Mortgage backed securities. His explanations are lucid and enormously helpful.

Also praiseworthy is the author's critique of Lehman itself, and his discussion of inside politics, mistakes that were made and other aspects of the downfall.

The lesson here to the reader is Patience. The prologue and first few chapters are painful reading.

My only criticisms are:

The book is not well written. There are many grammatical errors, typos, poorly constructed sentences, and a general abuse of punctuation which ultimately distract from the information the author intends to convey. I had the feeling that it was not edited by anyone, or even proofread, for that matter.

Secondly, the thesis is contradictory. First the author blames senior management for the downfall--specifically the inattention to risk management, the exposure to dangerous financial instruments and real estate portfolio--but in the penultimate chapter the author dumps it all in Paulson's lap. Some of the more recent books take a more balanced approach in trying to come to terms with who was to "blame."

There is much repitition in this book. To reiterate, it suffers terribly from the lack of a good editor.

But it is important in the sense that it represents a contribution to the archive of how to assess the near-cataclysm that happened last year.

I feel it was generous to award this book three stars. It is hard to justify spending nearly twenty bucks on this book when there are superior, more realistic books on this identical topic.

Finally, an insider who writes with intelligence (and surprisingly) heart about what it was really like inside Lehman Brothers in the months running up to it's collapse. This book is so well written and researched it will leave you wanting more. Joseph Tibman writes without the usual hyperbole, soundbites or self-importance that one has come to expect from an insider's book. He also sheds new light on the role of the ratings agencies as well as who was really in charge at Lehman. This book goes well beyond the headlines and digs deep into the the culture and personalities of the institution at the center of the global economic meltdown. This is the book that you've been waiting for.