Biography & Autobiography : Business

In this timely supplement to his incomparable reckoning with the contemporary financial world, Dr. Alan Greenspan presents his views on how the economy has changed since he wrote the #1 New York Times bestseller The Age of Turbulence. Covering the subprime mortgage crisis as well as other national and international issues, this Penguin eSpecial offers a front-line view of the global economy from the man who has worked at its heart longer and with greater effect than any other single living figure. more...

Price: $5.00

From humble beginnings as the son of a working-class family in suburban Washington state to one of the world’s richest men, Paul Allen’s life story reads like the American dream come true. But if Allen’s story is as familiar to us as any rags-to-riches tale, Allen himself has remained a curious enigma. more...

Price: $27.95

Every era has its merger; every era has its story. For the New Media age it was an even bigger disaster: the AOL–Time Warner deal. At the time AOL and Time Warner were considered a matchless combination of old media content and new media distribution. But very soon after the deal was announced things started to go bad – and then from bad to worse. Less than four years after the deal was announced, every significant figure in the deal –save the politically astute Richard Parsons – has left the company, along with scores of others. Nearly a $100 billion was written off and a stock that once traded at $100 now trades near $10. What happened? Where did it all go wrong? In this deeply sourced and deftly written book, Nina Munk gives us a window into the minds of two of the oddest men to ever run billion–dollar empires. Steve Case, the boy wonder who built AOL one free floppy disk at a time, was searching for a way out of the New Economy. Meanwhile Jerry Levin, who'd made his reputation as a visionary when he put HBO on satellite distribution, was searching for a monumental deal. These two men, more interested in their place in history than their personal fortunes, each thought they were out–smarting the other. more...

Price: $11.95

An enigmatic loner, misanthrope, and notorious miser, Livermore revolutionized the profession with his innovative timing techniques, money management strategies, and high-momentum approach to trading stocks. Smitten provides a vivid portrait of Livermore and the times in which he lived and operated. He deftly combines eyewitness accounts of those who knew Livermore with fascinating stories of sensational love affairs, shootings, and suicides, and a detailed exploration of the trading strategies that made Livermore several fortunes in his lifetime. more...

Price: $22.95

In his wry and funny memoir, Edward Ugel tells the story of America's addiction to the lottery from an astonishing angle. At age twenty–six, Ed found himself broke, knee–deep in gambling debt, and moving back into his parents' basement. It all changed, however, when he serendipitously landed a job as a salesman for The Firm – a company that offered up–front cash to lottery winners in exchange for their prize money, often paid in agonizingly small annual payments, some lasting up to twenty–five years. For the better part of the ensuing decade, Ed spent his time closing deals with lottery winners, making a lucrative and legitimate – if sometimes not–so–nice – living by taking advantage of their weaknesses... weaknesses he knew all too well. Ed met hundreds of lottery winners and saw up–close the often hilarious, sometime sad outcome when great wealth is dropped on ordinary people. Once lottery winners realized their "dream–come–true" multimillion jackpots were not all that they were cracked up to be, Ed would knock on their door, offering them the cash they wanted–and often desperately need. This cash sometimes came at a high price, but winners were rarely in a position to walk the other way. As Ed learned, few of them had the financial savvy to keep up with the lottery–winner lifestyle. In fact, some just wanted their old lives back. A charmingly neurotic gambler, Ed traveled deep into the heart of the country where he discovered the American Dream looks a lot like a day at the casino. And Ed knows casinos. In fact, his own taste for gambling gave him a unique insight into lottery winners: he intimately understood their mindset, making it that much easier to relate to them. And like lottery winners, Ed struggled to find balance in his own life as his increasing success earned him a bigger and bigger salary. Even as he relished his accomplishments, he grappled with th more...

Price: $11.95