Catastrophe: The Story of Bernard L. Madoff, the Man who Swindled the World

by Deborah Hart Strober

In this comprehensive account of Bernie Madoff’ s epic Ponzi scheme, Catastrophe exposes the real story behind the financial mastermind’ s upstanding faç ade— his confession, his family's involvement, and his unlikely rise and incredible crash. The book defines and explains the whole diabolical debacle, including how Madoff evaded SEC watchdogs and how his far-reaching crime pervaded the world. With first-hand accounts from his victims, the book peels back Madoff’ s persona layer by layer, revealing how he developed his elaborate deceit and how and why he targeted and scammed the world of Jewish philanthropy. Complete with the famous whistle-blower letter to the SEC, the Madoff company mission statement, SEC filings, and a list of victims— from housewives to household names- Catastrophe offers a complete look at the white-collar crime of the century, one that will leave readers astounded in disbelief.

Genres: Nonfiction, Crime, Business, History, Audiobook, Biography

304 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Jon Nakapalau · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cautionary tale that we can see is already forgotten; what excuse will there be for the next circumstance that places a wolf in (not sheep) shepherds clothing? The main point that I took away from this book is how protected you are by wealth: there were many red flags that were there for investigators to follow: but Madoff hat money and political connections - so those flags were ignored.

[Jamie from The Doer Co · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is probably a good starting point if you don't know much about the Madoff ponzi scheme. If you already know a lot about it, this book PROBABLY WON'T offer you any new insight - which is where I think some of the poor reviews come from. (Although FWIW the appendix is VERY impressive and interesting if you want to see documents from his website, court, a list of victims, etc.)

From what I can tell, and other reviews have said, this was one of the first books to come out after the scheme unravelled. The "book" is essentially a compilation of direct quotes, research from the authors, and news articles from the time. It wasn't super fun to read, and I found it to be a little repetitive - but overall I didn't know a lot about this so it was helpful factually. I was hoping to learn more about Bernie himself, but this book has more details on the timeline of his business operations and his professional/personal connections. 3 stars for the so-so writing quality, lack of insight into Madoff himself (outside of broad comments like "He seemed like such a nice guy!"), lack of information outside of a few hours on Google. I got it for $1 at a garage sale so I'm happy with it, I could also recommend borrowing it from a library - but I wouldn't recommend you pay full price for this.

Also, I found the chapter where the authors reproduced anti-Semitic language to be... Pointless? As there wasn't much commentary in that "section" besides "This scheme made anti-Semites come out of the woodworks!" - which had kind of already been made in the earlier chapters. Reading the comments from Nazis with literally 0 additional critical thought on the topic didn't add to my reading experience.

[Elizabeth]

I am fascinated by what this man pulled off. I initially heard about it on PBS's Frontline program followed by articles in the April, May and June issues of "Vanity Fair" magazine. I don't expect this to be the best book that will be written as it came out so soon following his arrest in December 2009, but it's capturing my attention.

[Ngaio · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have to say I'm disappointed in this book. I just finished Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup in which they compare that company to Bernie Madoff a lot. It made me consider that I know almost nothing about Madoff. I recognize the name as some famous American con guy, but that's the only context I have. I picked up this book hoping to fill in the blanks. That's not what this book was doing.

Normally, I'd expect a book on a financial crime to include some details about how the crime operated as well as biographical information on the people involved. This book did neither of those things. Instead it focused on why the crimes impacted the Jewish community more than others and speculated on who was in the know for the con. It has the feel of a book whipped off really quickly during a scandal to profit off the publicity. As things were on going as it was published, the book also doesn't include the outcomes of the various trials and lawsuits that would follow.

As someone who has no context for the events, the book was basically useless to me which makes me want to give it one star. However, had I been immersed in the coverage of the scandal as the authors appear to assume and was versed in all the details, perhaps I would have found the commentary in this book interesting. This might be a good book if it's the third or fourth book on the topic you've read. Not great if you don't know what's going on. 1.5 stars

[Ruth Santana Valencia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Que gran recopilación de opiniones sobre el estafador de la Nasdaq ya que no lo ponen como el gran villano de la historia sino como un hombre con luz y obscuridad, que eso si fue desleal a su comunidad judía y se hace poco creíble el pensar que el desfalco fue únicamente realizado por él (yo si creo que su círculo cercano estuvo involucrado)

Con este libro me quito la espina y vuelvo a leer en inglés.

Muy recomendable no se si este en español

[Shirley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was written right after the Bernie Madoff scandal came to light. I listened to the audiobook and it was mostly facts and figures which after a while were very boring. I was hoping for more personal information into the psyche of the man. Thank goodness it was only four hours long.

[Amy Morris · Rating 3 out of 5]

No new info. I think she wrote this early on to get first crack at the big story, so it doesn't hold up years later when much more has been written in depth.

[Cole · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book was very good factually and getting both sides to an argument. There were many people that the authors interviewed to find out the facts about Bernard Madoff. However, many of the people even with their titles given were very well known people. Many of the institutions and people named I had never heard of. They may have been very reliable but because I had no idea where they were coming from, they were of little use. Also although the other sides of the argument was presented the side the authors were in favor of was showed repeatedly. The authors put a very high emphasis of the fact that Madoff and many of his victims were Jewish. This was slightly annoying repeatedly bring up his race/religion. The fact that Madoff himself was Jewish has nothing to do with him running the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. If he had been Christian, or even another religion besides Judaism, would as big of a deal have been made about his religion? The book uses a lot of stock exchange terms, so you have to know a little bit about the stock market to understand what was so significant about what Madoff did. Finally it got annnoying when the authors repeatedly quote people saying how they had lost so much money and that they were so poor because they only had 500 millions dollars left after Madoff. While yes losing 100 million dollars is a lot to lose, if you still have half a billion dollars that is nothing to really complain about. Lots of people would love to make 1 millions dollars, let alone 500 million.

[Sandra · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wasn't expecting this to be a great book, or even good. I just happened to see it in the library on the new book shelf. The story is not over, that is when the book should be written. I guess I was, and still am hoping to see in print, advice for the investor who has average or below average skills in choosing investment funds, and siting specifics from this Ponzi scheme. Because Madoff wasn't getting super huge results, his investors were able to delude themselves that making 10-12 percent, EVERY MONTH, was possible. Even during the last recession. But in reality, it is impossible to make those kind of returns, consistently, month after month, with never a down turn, as Bernie was supposedly doing. This is Not Possible Folks! There are some investors sited in the book, who did not get sucked into this, asked the right questions, and chose not to give him their money. So what I came away with was the old axiom, "If it seems too good to be true, then it is." Guess for once in my life, I feel pretty fortunate that I didn't have 50 million dollars, and if I had, that I hadn't known Bernie! This story is certainly not over. It certainly has presented more questions for me. Mostly about family involvement. So if you are a fast reader, you may learn some things from this book, but don't seek it out.

[Jill · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a really interesting book. It was written by a husband/wife team he swindled, though it didn't have near the bitterness I anticipated. I learned an awful lot from this book, which really enforces the old addage: if it looks/sounds too good to be true, it is. A few people who were potential investors with Madoff decided against it, because they did their research and all the red flags for a Ponzi scheme were there. They recognized it before Madoff was exposed. One particular man apparently had been trying to expose Madoff for years, but nobody would listen to him. A bit of Emperor's New Clothes going on, but that doesn't make me feel any less sympathy for all the people and organizations - including his own friends and family members he swindled. This is the second book about Madoff I've read. Both were good learning experiences.

[Marylou · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing that this man was able to get away with ruining so many people's lives. This is when you wonder about who is doing their job ... and who is being paid not to do their job! For him not be in jail right now is a disgrace to the USA. Money is the root of ALL evil! I've lost a $100,000 this past year, so I can feel for every single one of these people who trusted someone they thought they could trust! I've been at the mercy of Merrill Lynch ... so I know how easy it is to just look at your month statement and not know what it even says!

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

I chose to listen to the audio book because I don't usually read this type of book. I get bored reading history books, memoirs and such...but I LOVE listening to history etc. being told to me either sitting at the feet of those who experienced it or through documentaries.

When all of this was happening, I had my head elsewhere and didn't pay much attention. So this book was quite informative. I now know what a Ponzi scheme is *lol* and have an appreciation for the enormity of what he did. Wow.

[Jbradley86 Bradley · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was clearly written in a hurry in order to be one of the "first" books on the market about Bernard Madoff. There is really no new information in this. There are a lot of one sentence comments from victims and people who have met Madoff. They also re-printed nasty comments anonymous posters made about Jewish people on the Internet. This is not what I was expecting. I found the April 2009 issue of Vanity Fair to have much more in depth information on Bernie Madoff and what he did.

[Cathie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fascinating subject, poorly written.

[Tom Nolan]

paperback 6x9