Torie's Reviews > Griftopia: Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and the Long Con That Is Breaking America

If you like acerbic wit, crystal clear explanations of dauntingly complicated financial ideas, and feeling completely hopeless about the future of the country, this is the book for you. Griftopia has had me depressed for weeks. That said, Taibbi is incredibly smart and incredibly funny, so you forgive the dark nature of the book. I can think of no one better to tackle the kind of difficult-to-understand and impossible-to-forgive shenanigans that are the subject matter.

My only real complaints are a) that he gets sidetracked in the first two chapters with, well, rants; and b) that he's occasionally a lazy writer. Anyone who invented the vampire squid metaphor is capable of rhetorical genius, and yet he often takes shortcuts with his writing, taking the easy way out of the explanation and parts feel downright sloppy. If he could rein in the impulses and go through a second round of edits it'd be 5 stars, no question.

Still a hearty recommend, for those with a strong stomach for narratives of the super-rich systemically fleecing the middle class.