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The Informant!

The Informant! by Kurt Eichenwald Portobello Books HK$128

Readers wondering at the heft of The Informant! will nod knowingly when Kurt Eichenwald reveals that his book grew out of 800 hours of interviews with 100-plus people during his five years at The New York Times spent covering price-fixing scandals at the Archer Daniels Midland food corporation. For years, Mark Whitacre, a top executive at one of America's most politically powerful companies, worked as a FBI mole to provide evidence of an international conspiracy to set prices for lysine, an additive to fatten chickens and pigs. Little did they know the man they had entrusted with wiretaps would turn out to be deranged and not above deceiving authorities as well as his employers, family and lawyer. Part business story, police procedural, comedy and expose of greed and corruption, this story, not surprisingly, caught the attention of Steven Soderbergh, who cast Matt Damon as the nutcase whistle-blower in his film adaptation. The book's pace is helped by dialogue that keeps the pages turning as the bizarre workings of the FBI and corporate America are exposed deliberately, but with a sense of humour.

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