Boomerang

Travels in the New Third World

By: Michael Lewis

Narrated by: Dylan Baker

Length: 7 hrs and 10 mins

Publisher's summary

From the #1 New York Times best-selling author of The Big Short, Liar’s Poker and The Blind Side!

The tsunami of cheap credit that rolled across the planet between 2002 and 2008 was more than a simple financial phenomenon: it was temptation, offering entire societies the chance to reveal aspects of their characters they could not normally afford to indulge.

The Greeks wanted to turn their country into a pinata stuffed with cash and allow as many citizens as possible to take a whack at it. The Germans wanted to be even more German; the Irish wanted to stop being Irish.

The trademark of Michael Lewis’s best sellers is to tell an important and complex story through characters so outsized and outrageously weird that you’d think they have to be invented. (You’d be wrong.) In Boomerang, we meet a brilliant monk who has figured out how to game Greek capitalism to save his failing monastery; a cod fisherman who, with three days’ training, becomes a currency trader for an Icelandic bank; and an Irish real estate developer so outraged by the collapse of his business that he drives across the country to attack the Irish Parliament with his earth-moving equipment.

Lewis’s investigation of bubbles beyond our shores is so brilliantly, sadly hilarious that it leads the American listener to a comfortable complacency: Oh, those foolish foreigners. But when Lewis turns a merciless eye on California and Washington DC, we see that the narrative is a trap baited with humor, and we understand the reckoning that awaits the greatest and greediest of debtor nations.

©2011 Michael Lewis (P)2011 Simon & Schuster

Critic reviews

“No one writes with more narrative panache about money and finance than Lewis.” (Michiko Kakutani, New York Times)

Michael Lewis NEVER Disappoints

I have read all his books but one and I love his intellect, his off piste way of looking at things and his unmatched ability to explain complicated subjects is a way that I can understand. Sometimes it’s more of a survey than a deep dive, sometimes I don’t need a deep dive. Teaming him with the voice of Dylan Baker is brilliant. I have come to enjoy his characters on TV and his voice reads Lewis better than Lewis. Excellent choice!

The reader understands and perfectly conveys the humor.

Lewis writes witty and is flabbergasted by what he uncovers. The reader perfectly performs the writing.

Boomerang

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

This is information that we all need to know.

What did you like best about this story?

This was written in a way that follows the money around the world. He interviews with people who influenced it's course and problems with our world wide economy from Subprime - Iceland - Greece, the entire Euro and even Ireland. Engrossing to say the least!

What does Dylan Baker bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

He has a stable voice with an edge of humor.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Following the reason Bass is such reliable a source; I was about sick when he interviews the Texas Hedgefunder and quotes his advice to buy hard assests like gold, nickels by the millions and firearms.

Educational and entertaining

In Boomerang Michael Lewis tells a number of stories illustrating the folly that was all too common in and around 2008, when the financial crisis hit the world economy. The first scene is Texas, US, where the author meets Kyle Bass, who became famous when he got rich from betting that sub-prime mortgages would go bust, which of course they did in the most spectacular manner. Since then, Bass has moved on to other types of bets, namely bets that nations will go bust. Bas thinks it is an inevitability given the amount of debt nations have accumulated. Indeed, when private businesses such as AIG, and large banks needed bailouts worth hundreds of billions of dollars, nations basically took over the debt. In some countries these bailouts means that the nations, which in the end means the citizens of those nations, have enormous debts. It appears unrealistic that they will ever be able to pay it off, and Kyle Bas bet that they will not.

Following this first encounter which sets the scene, Lewis travels to Iceland, Greece, Ireland, and Germany, before heading back to the state in the US which according to this book is in the most trouble… California. Lewis is a master when it comes to telling stories that are informal and amusing, and yet at the same time illustrates the economic events that lead to the 2008 meltdown of some economies. In Iceland for instance, Lewis meets with a fisherman who, before 2008, realized that he could make more money if they borrowed japanese yen at a 3% interest and used them to buy Icelandic kroner which rose by 16% a year. The resulting wealth of Iceland was insane considering that they only have 300.000 inhabitants. Iceland, via money trickery, became so rich that they were able to buy several of the UKs biggest banks meaning that Iceland had to pay when the bank was in trouble, which of course they could not…

In the last chapter we meet (to my surprise), no other than Mr. Governator i.e., Arnold Schwarzenegger. In describing this encounter, Lewis manages to simultaneously write about Schwarzenegger's maniac style bike rides through intersections with heavy traffic, and California's fiscal policy and potential collapse. After having read this book I see both California and Arnold Schwarzenegger in a new light

While I did learn new things this book did not fundamentally change me or the way I see the world. Still, it is not often you find a book which is as educational and at the same time entertaining, as Boomerang.

Elves, Purgation and the Cycle of Contempt

It's hard not to be entertained AND enlightened by a Michael Lewis book. His books exploring subjects like Major League Baseball, the NFL left tackle, the stock market and financial shorting are to non-fiction, somewhat like Apple was to personal computing. He has the creative ability to explain in clear and simple terms subjects that are complex or seem otherwise mundane. As Jobs said, "the way we’re running the company, the product design, the advertising, it all comes down to this: Let’s make it simple. Really simple,” noting the Da Vinci quote on Apple's first brochure: "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." As Isaacson's Jobs biography explained, what Jobs meant was that you have to work really hard and creatively on the difficult things to make them simple enough for to enjoy and understand.

Lewis writes with clarity and wit, using his unique creative abilities to render subjects compelling to the average reader. It's only a half-joke to say that if Lewis set his mind to fully understanding organic chemistry, he could deliver a book explaining it to the masses, or to proclaim that Lewis could deliver a best-seller about telephone books

I read BOOMERANG a few years back, lost it in a move and bought the audio version early this year after Greek citizens soundly rejected the terms of a proposed 2d bailout agreement. While published in 2011, the book is still a timely, excellent aid to understanding the basic root causes of the debacles in Greece, Iceland and Ireland, Germany's role in European collapse, as well as giving a view here at home via an abbreviated examination of California's economic and political climate.


To give a sampling of quotes from the book to show Lewis' ability to offer the intriguing with wit:

Iceland:
One problem encountered by “Alcoa, the biggest aluminum company in the country, ...when, in 2004, it set about erecting its giant smelting plant... [was] the so-called hidden people—or, to put it more plainly, elves—in whom some large number of Icelanders, steeped long and thoroughly in their rich folkloric culture, sincerely believe. Before Alcoa could build its smelter it had to defer to a government expert to scour the enclosed plant site and certify that no elves were on or under it. It was a delicate corporate situation, an Alcoa spokesman told me, because they had to pay hard cash to declare the site elf-free...."


Germany:
Lewis explains the Germans' obsession with human excrement, or scheiße (pronounced "scheisse"), as a way to explain that country's role in the global debt collapse:

“Germans longed to be near [scheiße], but not in it. This, as it turns out, is an excellent description of their role in the current financial crisis.”

"The first thing Gutenberg sought to publish, after the Bible, was a laxative timetable he called a 'Purgation-Calendar.' Then there is the astonishing number of anal German folk sayings. 'As the fish lives in water, so does the [scheiße] stick to the a$ $hole!,' to select but one of the seemingly endless examples.” Another is *you are just as dirty as toilet paper!*


Greece:
“Individual Greeks are delightful: funny, warm, smart, and good company. I left two dozen interviews saying... 'What great people!' They do not share the sentiment about one another: the hardest thing to do in Greece is to get one Greek to compliment another behind his back. No success of any kind is regarded without suspicion. Everyone is pretty sure everyone is cheating on his taxes, or bribing politicians, or taking bribes, or lying about the value of his real estate. And this total absence of faith in one another is self-reinforcing. The epidemic of lying and cheating and stealing makes any sort of civic life impossible; the collapse of civic life only encourages more lying, cheating, and stealing....”

"The retirement age for Greek jobs classified as 'arduous' is as early as [55] for men and [50] for women.... when the state begins to shovel out generous pensions...." Over 600 Greek professions were able to get so classified: "hairdressers, radio announcers, waiters, musicians, and on and on and on."


Ireland:
“The Irish people and their country are like lovers whose passion is heightened by their suspicion that they will probably wind up leaving each other.”


California:
"California had organized itself, not accidentally, into highly partisan legislative districts. It elected highly partisan people to office and then required these people to reach a two-thirds majority to enact any new tax or meddle with big spending decisions. On the off chance that they found some common ground, it could be pulled out from under them by voters through the initiative process. Throw in term limits—no elected official now serves in California government long enough to fully understand it—and you have a recipe for generating maximum contempt for elected officials. Politicians are elected to get things done and are prevented by the system from doing it, leading the people to grow even more disgusted with them. 'The vicious cycle of contempt,' as Mark Paul calls it. California state government was designed mainly to maximize the likelihood that voters will continue to despise the people they elect.'"


I highly recommend this book for both delight and enlightenment.

Perhaps the best writing you will read (or hear)

Michael Lewis is a top notch writer. He is at the top of his game. He provides so many witty remarks that I find myself laughing my entire drive listening to this book. It is a serious subject and everyone should read (hear) this to really know what is going on, however, the presentation is top notch and entertaining. The narrator is also excellent and this is now one of my favorite audio books.

A walk through the bubble

Where do bankers come from? They hatch from Icelandic fishing trawlers apparently, and the whole world stands by and watches them use other people's money to finance the purchase of some of the oldest institutions in Europe.

Greeks lie? They don't want to have to actually pay their govt. credit card off? They cheated the system to get the Euro? Did monks really abuse the Greek government by taking confessions as collateral in a leveraged buyout?

Did an American hedge fund manager predict the meltdown, and make out like a gold barron?

This book is a collection of stories and exploits by the centerpieces to the world's financial meltdown. It touches slightly on the real estate bubble, but it focuses mostly on Iceland and then quickly sails through Europe, Greece, and eventually the US.

The stories are all first hand accounts from government officials that sometimes speak more candidly than one would expect but I found myself at the halfway point wishing the end would come soon so I could move on to the next audiobook on my phone.

The author tends to throw the F word in every now and then for no seeming reason other than to wake the listener/reader up and make them pay attention to his commentary on the quote from the last interviewee. I found that completely unnecessary as I would just pause the book when I started to nod off and pickup again later.

I would only recommend this book if you want to hear some first hand accounts of where so many people fooled the system, themselves, their neighbors, and a couple of times were called out by people who were scorned, ridiculed, and told they would be sued if they didn't quit talking about the risk and improper bond ratings of the schemes that ultimately dealt the world a recession.

Entertaining story, but too simplistic

Michael Lewis describes the financial crisis in different countries. The book is full of interesting anecdotes and highly entertaining. His main thesis is that you can see a people’s character when they are in a dark room full of money. This line is too simplistic. The author does not know well the culture of most of the countries he visited or speaks their language, and much of the description is thus superficial. I say this as a German who lived 1/3 of his life in the USA. For example, the better performance of Germany in the current crisis is not so much caused by the alleged ‘anal fixation or holocaust-guilt ‘of the German people, but by a political system that is less dependent on campaign donations from banks and can therefore control the financial sector a little bit better than the US or Greece.

Concise but informative & interesting

This was a good explanation of the financial crisis in Europe, Greece and Iceland, with some insight into how it relates to the U.S. economy. It is a typical Michael Lewis book; fairly informal and occasionally crass, which is both appropriate and entertaining. Each chapter covers a different country's financial problems, with a vein of cultural commentary running throughout.

Interesting Listen

Overall, this was a very intersting book. Michael Lewis does capture the insanity from around the world that led to the economic collapse of 2008. You see why Greece was in so much turmoil and rioted. You see the crazy practices the US was imploring.

Dylan Baker was also very good reading the book. His narration gives you a sense of how rediculous the world was acting.