I read these books as a child and have looked everywhere for them since I was in the fifth grade. Meg is wonderful! Fun, spunky, smart...a great role model for girls. After I devoured all the Nancy Drew books and even gave the Hardy Boys some attention Meg was the next step and I think I loved her the most. Get the whole set and read them to your daughter - I promise, you'll have a good time.

This book covers the largest and probably the best of the leveraged buyout firms that became so popular and profitable in the 80's. What I would like to say is that this was an outstanding book that is the leader of the class on this topic. You get a wonderfully documented and rich description of the group of high finance leaders during the 80's Junk Bond and M&A scandals. The author also provides a very readable explanation of the tools used in both the legitimate and illegal side of this issue. This is just a detailed and exciting book; the extra pages and detail do not slow it down at all. The personal descriptions of the people behind the "KKR" names is very interesting, it is something that many massive ego's could actually work together even if they are family.
If you are interested in this topic then I would suggest you also read "Predator's Ball" and "Den of Thieves". If you read only one book on this topic then this is the book to read.

This book presents in a very simple way the basics of money and credit. Of course time changes everything, but in spite of that, this book may orient economists and non economists who are begining to know the fundamentals of central and commercial banking and the dynamics of money.

This is a must-have book on the most important topic in the world, MONEY.

All of Dowd's books are of key importance.

From approximately 1312 to 1415 Bruges was the hub of European trade. English wool came to the Staple where it was distributed to the Flemish weavers, made into cloth and sold all over the world. Spices and silks from the caravan trade arrived in Venice and were carted to Bruges for sale in northern Europe. The bulky goods were moved about by the merchant; what about his money? One day he has many bags of gold coins and another day he has few or none. He needs to be able to deposit his gold somewhere and have a written certificate of deposit for it--that is, credit. So one merchant becomes a banker--he stays in one place, receiving and paying out. The coins--from all over the world--are a problem. The banker becomes money-changer. He takes gold coins to the mint to be melted down and made into local coinage.

The Lombards ran pawn shops, the equivalent of today's plastic credit card. Consumer debt, at fairly high interest rates, with the pawned objects as security, starts here. Very poor people who needed to borrow small sums from time to time depended on the Lombards--and hated them too. Notice that widows and others could invest in the pawn shop--loan money to the Lombards--and receive interest once a year. This was working capital for the pawn shop owner; otherwise he would have a warehouse full of objects and no money to lend to his customers.

Goods flowed and credit flowed and business boomed. There were defaults; too many defaults would drive the bankers, money-changers and Lombards into bankruptcy which in turn ruined merchants and manufacturers. Finally Bruges lost out to Antwerp.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The author gives interpretations as well as facts. One can get a clear picture of Bruges in its heyday.

It is unfortunate that a book of such wide applicability and interest to anyone doing research in the fields of macroeconomics and the history of economic thought is so high-priced. As D.P. O'Brien said in The Economic Journal, "Virtually no essay in the collection is without interest and it should be on the bookshelves of everybody interested in monetary economics." How about a paperback version?

The research behind this look at MTV is solid and groundbreaking...it's a shame the book went out of print..it is timeless.

A simple, straightforward yet poetic book, imaginatively illustrated, which communicates a real value of life...'A moon boy is not a toy, you can't lock it in a box, you have to let it go'...which I enjoy as much as my 3-year-old (and its her favorite).

This is a great book for junior high kids. It goes hand in hand with the Texas History that is taught in 7th grade. I highly recommend anyone who wants a realistic look at what the real life trials and struggles life would be like during the time period the story takes place.

This book is very much in the genre of Tom Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities" and Bryan Burrough's "Barbarians at the Gate" - all packaged with a distinct Australian flavour.

The story documents the twilight years of a high profile Australian Bank (State Bank of New South Wales) until its eventual privatisation in 1994. From 54 expressions of interest, a solitary bidder emerged, extracting a plethora of guarantees and caveats from an enthusiastic vendor and effectively reducing the sale price to one more akin to a Thanksgiving sale at Wal Mart. Compared to more recent sales, it's easy to sympathise with Hand's conclusion that this was "the biggest Bank heist of all time". Indeed, within 5 years, the purchaser (Colonial Mutual) had onsold the Bank (and itself in the process) for over 10 times the purchase price.

But the story is much bigger than State Bank in isolation. Hand meanders around Australian Banking in general during the 1990s, coining the term "mating call" to illustrate Australia's unofficial banking cartel. And yet the story is more than a factual guide to contemporary banking - it's also about changing social attitudes and community values. The chapter named "From revered to reviled" illustrates bankers simply ignoring their demise in community stature, actively absolving themselves of social responsibilities in the name of "shareholder value".

The diversity of anecdotes range from young-gun dealers cheering disastrous employment statistics when it suits the portfolio to the multimillion dollar executive payouts as rural branch closures gather pace. One gem is an assessment of the Bank's bizarre attempt to market a variety of new fees as being of benefit to customers. Overall, the book is factual, well researched and entertaining, offering a balanced commentary and avoiding the easier path of sensationalism. The book is also critical of the government's splashing of public monies around simply to bolster their own fortunes.

Hand has a very entertaining writing style with a strong social conscience, offering meaningful anecdotes and insightful commentary. He has a great strategic perspective of Banking that that makes it so easy to see the woods from the trees. I just think it's a great rollicking yarn with a significance that will grow rather than diminish over time.