THE BIG SHORT Inside the Doomsday Machine

Much of what caused the recent financial crisis is buried in complicated financial transactions and shady accounting practices. This book does an outstanding job of demystifying the schemes that led to the meltdown. As such, it’s an accessible history of the period from 2005 to 2008, when the housing market imploded. Narrator Jesse Boggs has a pleasant, informative voice that conveys the book’s ideas but misses the author’s tone of outrage. Boggs’s pitch does rise as the story becomes more outrageous, but his energy level still remains too low for the compelling nature of the events he recounts. His pacing and diction are excellent, and his decision to underplay the characters allows the debacle itself to take center stage. Nonetheless, one can’t help wishing for a more forceful delivery. R.I.G. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine [Published: APRIL 2010]