People write books for many reasons. Some reasons motivate excellent monographs. Others do not. Tavakoli is releasing this book after launching herself as an independent consultant, so her intentions may have something to do with marketing.

If I rated books on entertainment value alone, this book would score five stars. There are plenty of "war stories," irreverent comments and from-the-trading-floor perspectives. Several pages are devoted to financial shenanigans, intrigue and murder within the walls of the Vatican. While all this makes for interesting reading, its relevance to collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) is remote.

My primary criticism of the book is that the author has a very hard time defining concepts. She seems to feel that, if she immerses readers in the minutia of a concept long enough, they will eventually see the forest for the trees. In this case, I think it unlikely.

Accordingly, I do not recommend this book as an introduction to CDOs. Readers with little or no experience in this market will be lost. However, there is a tremendous amount of information here. Readers who come to it with prior knowledge of CDOs will find plenty to digest.