“Engrossing” - The Austin American Statesman “First-class entertainment” -Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post At the end of it those of less ample fortunes will feel their Schadenfreude richly indulged.” - The Economist It is a ripping read from start to finish.

This one is even larger in scope, and tells the story of the rise and fall of four of the giant oil families of Texas. What’s not to enjoy about a book full of monstrous egos, unimaginable sums of money and the punishment of greed and shortsightedness by the march of events? Bryan Burrough, a former Wall Street Journal correspondent and one of the two writers behind the hugely successful “Barbarians at the Gate,” now offers another cautionary tale. Harry Hurt, New York Times Sunday Business Section

“It would be hard to ask for a literally or figuratively richer cast of characters than those in ‘The Big Rich.’. Burrough has also done estimable new reporting, showing links between Texas money and national politics that stretch back far earlier than the days of Lyndon B. His set pieces describing the events at Spindletop, the gusher that started it all, and the rise and fall of the wildcatter Glenn McCarthy (the model for Ferber’s Jett Rink) are impeccably rendered, as are the tales of many other fabled characters. But Burrough, with his gifts for synthesis and lyricism, brings more to the table than that. In 2009, the book was made into a movie starring Johnny Depp.

For Burrough, the story is about the bureaucratic evolution of the FBI from a bungling group of amateurs to a professional crime-fighting organization and his central aim is to reclaim the history for the individual agents involved. America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34īurrough examines the stories of John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, the Barker-Karpis Gang, Machine Gun Kelly, and Bonnie and Clyde as a single narrative history of the FBI’s “War on Crime” from 1933 to 1936.

Public Enemies by Bryan Burrough