Status
Checked out
Due 22-02-2024
Call number
Collection
Publication
Picador (2019), Edition: Main Market, 320 pages
Description
"The full inside story of the breathtaking rise and shocking collapse of Theranos--the Enron of Silicon Valley--by the prize-winning journalist who first broke the story and pursued it to the end in the face of pressure and threats from the CEO and her lawyers. In 2014, Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes was widely seen as the female Steve Jobs: a brilliant Stanford dropout whose startup "unicorn" promised to revolutionize the medical industry with a machine that would make blood tests significantly faster and easier. Backed by investors such as Larry Ellison and Tim Draper, Theranos sold shares in an early fundraising round that valued the company at $9 billion, putting Holmes's worth at an estimated $4.7 billion. There was just one problem: the technology didn't work. For years, Holmes had been misleading investors, FDA officials, and her own employees. When Carreyrou, working at the Wall Street Journal, got a tip from a former Theranos employee and started asking questions, both Carreyrou and the Journal were threatened with lawsuits. Undaunted, the newspaper ran the first of dozens of Theranos articles in late 2015. By early 2017, the company's value was zero and Holmes faced potential legal action from the government and her investors. Here is the riveting story of the biggest corporate fraud since Enron, a disturbing cautionary tale set amid the bold promises and gold-rush frenzy of Silicon Valley"--… (more)
Media reviews
The author’s description of Holmes as a manic leader who turned coolly hostile when challenged is ripe material for a psychologist; Carreyrou wisely lets the evidence speak for itself. As presented here, Holmes harbored delusions of grandeur but couldn’t cope with the messy realities of
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bioengineering. Swathed in her own reality distortion field, she dressed in black turtlenecks to emulate her idol Jobs and preached that the Theranos device was “the most important thing humanity has ever built.” Employees were discouraged from questioning this cultish orthodoxy by her “ruthlessness” and her “culture of fear.” Secrecy was obsessive. Labs and doors were equipped with fingerprint scanners. Show Less
User reviews
LibraryThing member lisapeet
This account of a Silicon Valley med tech startup that attracted high-profile investors, supporters, and press without ever coming close to delivering on its promise—largely due to the charismatic young woman at its helm—and its takedown by a Wall Street Journal reporter is riveting and fun.
Carreyrou is in the story, and he mentions some of the investigative work he does, but what he never touches on—probably wisely, given the book's tone and scope—is how incredibly exciting, and probably often terrifying, bringing this story to light must have been. I'm very glad he turned it into a book, though, and recommend it all around.
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All the more so because it wasn't a book I'd have picked up ordinarily, but I read it for a panel I moderated at LJ's Day of Dialog and I'm greatly glad I did. This is great book-length investigative reporting, but never felt needlessly padded out. Rather, it had all the elements of a good thriller, including hubris, whistleblowers, big venture cap money, patients in potential peril, and a truly byzantine antiheroine. Carreyrou is in the story, and he mentions some of the investigative work he does, but what he never touches on—probably wisely, given the book's tone and scope—is how incredibly exciting, and probably often terrifying, bringing this story to light must have been. I'm very glad he turned it into a book, though, and recommend it all around.
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LibraryThing member norabelle414
Elizabeth Holmes had three things: wealthy connections, two semesters of college, and a dream of revolutionizing the biotech industry and being the next Steve Jobs. What she didn't have was any fucking idea what she was doing. She didn't let that stop her when she dropped out of Stanford at age 19
This book is completely riveting. The writing is very good and Carreyrou's evidence and argument is well-organized thematically, without letting the reader lose track of the timeline. I gulped down multiple chapters at a time that overflowed with connections to my work, to other Silicon Valley/startup drama (Facebook, Elon Musk, Uber, Juicero), and to our current presidential situation. This story has everything: flouting of FDA regulations, famous old white men with more money than sense, non-disclosure agreements, test results faked from halfway across the globe, Halloween parties.... It would be a great romp if it didn't also involve thousands of people getting incorrect medical tests. We're used to startup culture being bizarre, but this put people's lives at risk.
This book was rushed to publication early 2018 to coincide with Holmes' indictment for fraud. It shows in the later 10-20%, where the book kind of falls apart. This book feels like really great background to a different book that Carreyrou will hopefully write 5 to 10 years from now. It was good to get everything down on paper and out in the public, but it's too recent for any decent hindsight.
The only substantive problem I had with the book was the role in the story of Sunny Balwani. Though not a major character in this book, he was COO and president of Theranos while secretly in a cohabitating romantic relationship with Holmes for at least eleven years. That's suspicious enough, even aside from the fact that he is 19 years older than her, and the two of them met while she was still in high school. Carreyrou acknowledges the bad optics of this situation, but states, "Employees who saw the two interact up close describe a partnership in which Holmes, even if she was almost twenty years younger, had the last say. Moreover, Balwani didn't join Theranos until late 2009. By then, Holmes had already been misleading pharmaceutical companies for years about the readiness of her technology." Certainly Holmes should not absolved of anything she did, but it wouldn't hurt to give Balwani more scrutiny and not try to wave away the possibility of abuse just because employees didn't see him abusing her.
If this kind of intrigue sounds interesting to you, or you'd like to get up-to-date on the latest news, read away! It's a good one. If you want to wait for a version of the story more polished and less myopic, I don't blame you.
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to start Theranos, a company which she claimed would be able to invent a machine the size of a microwave that could run hundreds of different blood tests in a short amount of time. Over the course of the next several years Holmes convinced everyone from politicians to multi-national corporations, from Henry Kissinger to Walgreens, to invest in her company's efforts, resulting in a valuation of $10 billion. And then it all came crashing down in 2015 when the author of this book published a series of articles in the Wall Street Journal exposing Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos as completely fraudulent.This book is completely riveting. The writing is very good and Carreyrou's evidence and argument is well-organized thematically, without letting the reader lose track of the timeline. I gulped down multiple chapters at a time that overflowed with connections to my work, to other Silicon Valley/startup drama (Facebook, Elon Musk, Uber, Juicero), and to our current presidential situation. This story has everything: flouting of FDA regulations, famous old white men with more money than sense, non-disclosure agreements, test results faked from halfway across the globe, Halloween parties.... It would be a great romp if it didn't also involve thousands of people getting incorrect medical tests. We're used to startup culture being bizarre, but this put people's lives at risk.
This book was rushed to publication early 2018 to coincide with Holmes' indictment for fraud. It shows in the later 10-20%, where the book kind of falls apart. This book feels like really great background to a different book that Carreyrou will hopefully write 5 to 10 years from now. It was good to get everything down on paper and out in the public, but it's too recent for any decent hindsight.
The only substantive problem I had with the book was the role in the story of Sunny Balwani. Though not a major character in this book, he was COO and president of Theranos while secretly in a cohabitating romantic relationship with Holmes for at least eleven years. That's suspicious enough, even aside from the fact that he is 19 years older than her, and the two of them met while she was still in high school. Carreyrou acknowledges the bad optics of this situation, but states, "Employees who saw the two interact up close describe a partnership in which Holmes, even if she was almost twenty years younger, had the last say. Moreover, Balwani didn't join Theranos until late 2009. By then, Holmes had already been misleading pharmaceutical companies for years about the readiness of her technology." Certainly Holmes should not absolved of anything she did, but it wouldn't hurt to give Balwani more scrutiny and not try to wave away the possibility of abuse just because employees didn't see him abusing her.
If this kind of intrigue sounds interesting to you, or you'd like to get up-to-date on the latest news, read away! It's a good one. If you want to wait for a version of the story more polished and less myopic, I don't blame you.
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LibraryThing member reesa00
A great book on the rise and fall of Theranos. I read the original WSJ article a few years ago but loved all the additional detail in the book. The author does a good job of providing the science needed to understand the company at the level for non-scientists. There is also a wide range of
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individuals and levels interviewed in this book which provided a unique perspective. Definitely recommend this book to people who have read Barbarians at the Gate, Too Big to Fail, The Smartest Guys in the Room, etc. Show Less
LibraryThing member nyiper
This was exactly like reading an exciting novel---a case of life being stranger than fiction---and frankly, horrifying that one young woman could wreak such havoc on so many people's lives with her ability to market herself. Carreyrou is an excellent writer---the story is full of details and the
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time line is fascinating. It's frightening to see how many supposedly "intelligent" people she was able to manipulate. Show Less
LibraryThing member Katya0133
A history of the rise and fall of a Silicon Valley medical technology company. Even though some parts of the ending are a foregone conclusion (i.e., you are currently holding this book in your hands), the book reads like a thriller. Highly recommended.
LibraryThing member TheAmpersand
Not a bad book, but not what I was expecting, either. "Bad Blood" is a fairly straightforward journalistic account of the Theranos scandal. It's well researched and well-told, but I may have been looking for another kind of book. "Bad Blood" tells its story skillfully enough, but it doesn't really
Even so, the rise and fall of Theranos is a pretty good story. It's still shocking to consider that Holmes seems to have suckered everyone from Henry Kissinger to Chelsea Clinton to James Mattis to seasoned venture capitalists. If nothing else, "Bad Blood" is a warning about how easy it is for seemingly intelligent people to get it completely wrong. While Carreyrou does point out that very few of Theranos's backers had a background in pathology or medical devices, the reader is more or less left to conclude that Holmes got an amazing amount of mileage out of her personality, her good looks, and people's desire to ride the technological wave she promised them was on its way. The portrait of Holmes he paints here is certainly arresting: beautiful but socially aggressive and bent on control, she repeats falsehoods with remarkable ease throughout "Bad Blood" and seems to have a bottomless appetite for power and control, along with a taste for expensive parties. What's especially chilling, especially in light of our current concern about internet privacy and data breeches, is the company's obsession with secrecy and security. It's eerie to see Holmes, her boyfriend, and their lawyers effectively weaponize many of the technologies that Silicon Valley developed for their own benefit, particularly since Sunny, Holmes's boyfriend, comes off as a straight-up bully and minor-league thug. What's even weirder is the propagandizing that went on within the company itself: Theranos seems to have taken standard internet age optimism to a creepy extreme, and Holmes herself seems to have seen herself as a figure of world-historical importance. Some of the behavior described in this book seems more appropriate to a cult than a company.. It's honestly heartening to see that a lot of employees and former employees shrugged a lot of this off and made fun of their egomaniacal, controlling bosses behind their backs. What's also heartening is the courage that this story's whistleblowers, most of whom became Carreyou's sources, showed in the months that led up to the company's downfall. Theranos's lawyers were exceptionally ruthless, and many of those who spoke up were threatened, intimidated, and even surveilled. The author points out the obvious in his acknowledgements section when he calls them the real heroes of this story. "Bad Blood" itself would seem to make that absolutely indisputable.
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delve into the deeper reasons why Elizabeth Holmes's scam worked as well as it did for as long as it did. The author offers only a couple of paragraphs of speculation about what her motives might have been, and, while there's an implicit critique of the tech-crazed, ostentatiously wealthy Silicon Valley scene in "Bad Blood," it doesn't really provide a comprehensive analysis of what, exactly, made this particular failure of capitalism possible. The book is concerned with what happened, but not why it happened, and touches only briefly on what it might mean for the rest of us.Even so, the rise and fall of Theranos is a pretty good story. It's still shocking to consider that Holmes seems to have suckered everyone from Henry Kissinger to Chelsea Clinton to James Mattis to seasoned venture capitalists. If nothing else, "Bad Blood" is a warning about how easy it is for seemingly intelligent people to get it completely wrong. While Carreyrou does point out that very few of Theranos's backers had a background in pathology or medical devices, the reader is more or less left to conclude that Holmes got an amazing amount of mileage out of her personality, her good looks, and people's desire to ride the technological wave she promised them was on its way. The portrait of Holmes he paints here is certainly arresting: beautiful but socially aggressive and bent on control, she repeats falsehoods with remarkable ease throughout "Bad Blood" and seems to have a bottomless appetite for power and control, along with a taste for expensive parties. What's especially chilling, especially in light of our current concern about internet privacy and data breeches, is the company's obsession with secrecy and security. It's eerie to see Holmes, her boyfriend, and their lawyers effectively weaponize many of the technologies that Silicon Valley developed for their own benefit, particularly since Sunny, Holmes's boyfriend, comes off as a straight-up bully and minor-league thug. What's even weirder is the propagandizing that went on within the company itself: Theranos seems to have taken standard internet age optimism to a creepy extreme, and Holmes herself seems to have seen herself as a figure of world-historical importance. Some of the behavior described in this book seems more appropriate to a cult than a company.. It's honestly heartening to see that a lot of employees and former employees shrugged a lot of this off and made fun of their egomaniacal, controlling bosses behind their backs. What's also heartening is the courage that this story's whistleblowers, most of whom became Carreyou's sources, showed in the months that led up to the company's downfall. Theranos's lawyers were exceptionally ruthless, and many of those who spoke up were threatened, intimidated, and even surveilled. The author points out the obvious in his acknowledgements section when he calls them the real heroes of this story. "Bad Blood" itself would seem to make that absolutely indisputable.
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LibraryThing member Paulslibrary
It's been a while since I've read a book so engrossing I had a hard time putting it down. Exceptionally well written and researched book. Once Theronos's deceit was made public their fall was just as meteoric as their rise. It's depressing to realize even after financial disasters such as Enron and
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the 2008 financial crisis that companies like Theronos can still deceive on a grand scale. Show Less
LibraryThing member booklove54
This book should go in the true-crime category, since that is what it is. Truly, it's a shocker. You'll never look at the healthcare industry the same way again. Or at lawyers, for that matter. But then, you never really liked lawyers much, did you?
LibraryThing member tangledthread
This book was a page turner for me. It is the story of Elizabeth Holmes and how she used deceit, sleight of hand, nondisclosure agreements, and litigation to commit fraud, and medical abuse through her fantastical blood testing system.
The fact that she conned men like George Schultz, Henry
The most unsettling thing about the story is not that it was the rule of law that brought her down, it was good investigative journalism that brought her to the attention of the regulatory system and the legal system.
I came across this book because of an interview of John Carreyrou on Preet Bharara's blog: Stay Tuned with Preet. Am so glad I did!
The fact that she conned men like George Schultz, Henry
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Kissinger, General Mattis, Rupert Murdoch and many more into giving her money and serving on her board is jaw dropping. The most unsettling thing about the story is not that it was the rule of law that brought her down, it was good investigative journalism that brought her to the attention of the regulatory system and the legal system.
I came across this book because of an interview of John Carreyrou on Preet Bharara's blog: Stay Tuned with Preet. Am so glad I did!
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LibraryThing member dougcornelius
Add Bad Blood to the top of your to-read list.
Bad Blood tells the terrible story of Theranos and its founder, Elizabeth Holmes. She took the Silicon Valley habit of vaporware and “fake it ’til you make it” to medical devices. The Theranos machines were unreliable, if they worked at all. Bad
To be a bit sympathetic to Ms. Holmes, it wasn’t all about the money. I’m sure she enjoyed the public admiration and accolades. The book doesn’t have her talking about rolling in piles of cash. Ms. Holmes was passionate about her vision of a revolution in health care to save lives and improve health outcomes. She was motivating the Theranos employees to go along with the bad acts to achieve the revolution.
She believed the entrenched blood testing laboratories, Quest Diagnostics and LabCorp, were out to stop her and stop the revolution. Doubts about the viability of Theranos’s products were perceived by Holmes as sabotage by the entrenched blood testing companies.
At some point she embraced the limelight and began believing her vision was working. Facts just got in the way. Success at the company was more likely if you told Ms. Holmes what she wanted to hear.
The company failed at corporate governance. Ms. Holmes had nearly all of the voting rights. There was no check on her power. The powerless board was full of statesman, not professional investors, corporate managers or medical experts. A Board of Directors with Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of State George Shultz, William Perry (former Secretary of Defense), , Sam Nunn (former U.S. Senator), and James Mattis (General, USMC) is impressive. But they brought no expertise or guidance for a medical device start up.
Bad Blood tells the terrible story of Theranos and its founder, Elizabeth Holmes. She took the Silicon Valley habit of vaporware and “fake it ’til you make it” to medical devices. The Theranos machines were unreliable, if they worked at all. Bad
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software will mess with a company’s data. Bad medical devices could kill people.To be a bit sympathetic to Ms. Holmes, it wasn’t all about the money. I’m sure she enjoyed the public admiration and accolades. The book doesn’t have her talking about rolling in piles of cash. Ms. Holmes was passionate about her vision of a revolution in health care to save lives and improve health outcomes. She was motivating the Theranos employees to go along with the bad acts to achieve the revolution.
She believed the entrenched blood testing laboratories, Quest Diagnostics and LabCorp, were out to stop her and stop the revolution. Doubts about the viability of Theranos’s products were perceived by Holmes as sabotage by the entrenched blood testing companies.
At some point she embraced the limelight and began believing her vision was working. Facts just got in the way. Success at the company was more likely if you told Ms. Holmes what she wanted to hear.
The company failed at corporate governance. Ms. Holmes had nearly all of the voting rights. There was no check on her power. The powerless board was full of statesman, not professional investors, corporate managers or medical experts. A Board of Directors with Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of State George Shultz, William Perry (former Secretary of Defense), , Sam Nunn (former U.S. Senator), and James Mattis (General, USMC) is impressive. But they brought no expertise or guidance for a medical device start up.
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LibraryThing member KimMeyer
It took me a bit to get into this, but it's exhaustively researched and SO fascinating!
LibraryThing member breic
I started this book only skeptically. I had read an excerpt in a magazine and thought that was probably enough. How much do we really need to know? The book doesn't start too strong. It repeats uncritically gossip about Holmes, the Theranos founder. The perspective is one-sided, without giving
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Holmes or Balwani any opportunity for rebuttal. Initially, I had assumed that the story would be a typical well-intentioned small lie becomes a medium lie, to cover it up, becomes a big lie tragedy. But this doesn't seem to be the case at all. Unfortunately, we never really learn for sure the underlying motivations of Holmes and Balwani. But the incredible extent of their deception and mismanagement is fascinating. Show Less
LibraryThing member msf59
“We turned to my questions about the Edison. How many blood tests did Theranos perform on the device? That too was a trade secret, they said. I felt like I was watching a live performance of the Theater of the Absurd.”
This would make a perfect episode on the British science fiction anthology,
This is scary, jaw-dropping reporting and this prize-winning journalist, (who broke the case) does a stellar job, turning this story into a fascinating, sometimes unsettling, read. I am not sure if Elizabeth Holmes, is going to prison or not, (she definitely deserves it) but if she doesn't I bet our current Commander in Chief, would love to have her in his cabinet.
This would make a perfect episode on the British science fiction anthology,
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Black Mirror: How a twenty-something, college drop-out, transformed herself into a billionaire, creating a biotech start-up, with a promise to revolutionize the blood testing industry. She was an industrious fund-raiser and surrounded herself with a who's who of supporters, like Robert Murdoch, General “Mad-Dog” Mattis, George Shultz and Henry Kissinger. Just one glitch though...her technology did not work. This is scary, jaw-dropping reporting and this prize-winning journalist, (who broke the case) does a stellar job, turning this story into a fascinating, sometimes unsettling, read. I am not sure if Elizabeth Holmes, is going to prison or not, (she definitely deserves it) but if she doesn't I bet our current Commander in Chief, would love to have her in his cabinet.
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LibraryThing member mlhershey
Thorough accoount, well written, hard to believe if I hadn't read i
LibraryThing member Stbalbach
Elizabeth Holmes is a vampire, in Carreyrou's telling a black and white monster. It's so rewarding to read about her comeuppance. I wish it explored more her psychology, the power she had over old men, feminism. I wish it delved more broadly into psychopath CEOs because this is not a 1-off case.
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Nevertheless the system seemed to work - journalism exposed the lies, regulators intervened and courts shut it down. This is why attacks on those institutions by politicians (Trump) are so disturbing, people like Holmes would take over given the chance. The story of Holmes is not over, she is talented and may not go down so easily. Giving three point five stars because it was rushed to print before the "rest of the story" and lacking broader context - which is understandable given the upcoming court cases to get the full story out to the public. A movie is in the works. A straight factual account well told, so far. Show Less
LibraryThing member rivkat
History of Theranos from the WSJ reporter who broke much of the story of its lying and cheating. Its founder worshiped Steve Jobs and claimed to have invented a new technology that would make home blood tests simple and painless, but couldn’t deliver and kept doubling down on the fantasy. She
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even convinced Walgreens and Safeway that she could help them destroy their competition. Carreyrou doesn’t spend much time on what made the decisionmakers tick, whether that’s Elizabeth Holmes (who he at the end calls a sociopath, without elaboration) or the people who kept funding her, though he does better with the people in the middle—the ones who tolerated the scam for as long as they could in the hopes of improvement or because they were scared of having their lives destroyed. Show Less
LibraryThing member baranovv
It is a very detailed timeline of the events that happened at Theranos. A great example of salesmanship without any actual leadership. It was surprising to see how far Holmes got through political charm and intimidation.
LibraryThing member jamespurcell
This story of how a bright, entrepreneurial, Stephen Jobs "want to be" perpetuated a failed process and made millions demonstrates clearly the power and value of our free press. The WSJ reporter who pursued an outstanding investigation while assailed by relentless, notable but with questionable
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moral and ethical values, attorneys deserves to be highly lauded. Show Less
LibraryThing member ASKelmore
Best for:
Anyone who enjoys a true story about shady people who (for the most part) get what’s coming to them.
In a nutshell:
An experienced Elizabeth Holmes convinces a lot of people that she is on to the next big thing in biotechnology. She isn’t, and she gets VERY touchy when people point that
Worth quoting:
N/A
Why I chose it:
I listened to the podcast “The Drop Out,” which is just a few episodes long, but was definitely enough to get me interested.
Review:
Oh MY god did I love this book. I purchased the audio version and planned to listen to it during some long runs I have coming up. Instead, I could barely put it down, and listened to it every chance I got. It is a meticulously researched book, and Carreyrou explains complicated things (like how blood tests work) in ways that are not condescending or difficult to understand. The story develops slowly but never drags, as Carreyrou lays out the entire fiasco step by step.
What it comes down to is the Elisabeth Holmes was — is — a fraud. I think she started out with an idea (blood testing without the needles), and then became like a dog with a bone. She couldn’t and wouldn’t accept anyone disagreeing with her, because she was going to change the world. I don’t believe she was motivated by greed or money; I think she was fully motivated by her ego. She couldn’t dare admit that she was in over her head, or that her company Theranos wasn’t able to do what she promised; she just kept lying to others (and possibly herself) in the hopes that everything would work itself out.
The story is at times unbelievable. The number of attorneys involved. The cloak and dagger way the company treated its ‘trade secrets.’ The threatening letters. The lawsuits. The firings of anyone who questions anything. To think that people act this way — and think it is justified — is distressing to say the least. And frankly, I reserve about as much disgust for the attorneys who did Elisabeth Holmes’s bidding as I do for Holmes and her C-suite colleagues. The way the tormented people is offensive.
One area I think could have been developed a little bit more is the exploration of what the failures of the blood testing did to people’s lives. Carreyrou does share some stories of those who were harmed — such as a woman who ended up with $3,000 in unnecessary medical bills — but that can at times get lost in the story. And of course many of the whistle-blowers were motivated by the danger that faulty blood testing can cause, but it still wasn’t necessarily woven in as much as I would have liked. But that’s a very minor quibble, because it’s definitely discussed.
A little more than halfway through the book, the author become part of the story. It’s a slightly dramatic moment, but I think it is handled very well. The investigation of the Wall Street Journal article that predates the book is a huge reason why Theranos has been sued and why some of its leadership have been charged with crimes. It would be impossible for him to stay out of it, and the book would have suffered greatly without his perspective being shared in this way.
There were many moment when I got so angry at the things people were getting away with, but the last couple of chapters — I mean, there are some serious just deserts being served. It’s chef’s kiss come to life.
Keep it / Pass to a Friend / Donate it / Toss it: Keep it. And probably listen again soon.
Anyone who enjoys a true story about shady people who (for the most part) get what’s coming to them.
In a nutshell:
An experienced Elizabeth Holmes convinces a lot of people that she is on to the next big thing in biotechnology. She isn’t, and she gets VERY touchy when people point that
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out. Also, lots of powerful old white guys make some absurd financial decisions.Worth quoting:
N/A
Why I chose it:
I listened to the podcast “The Drop Out,” which is just a few episodes long, but was definitely enough to get me interested.
Review:
Oh MY god did I love this book. I purchased the audio version and planned to listen to it during some long runs I have coming up. Instead, I could barely put it down, and listened to it every chance I got. It is a meticulously researched book, and Carreyrou explains complicated things (like how blood tests work) in ways that are not condescending or difficult to understand. The story develops slowly but never drags, as Carreyrou lays out the entire fiasco step by step.
What it comes down to is the Elisabeth Holmes was — is — a fraud. I think she started out with an idea (blood testing without the needles), and then became like a dog with a bone. She couldn’t and wouldn’t accept anyone disagreeing with her, because she was going to change the world. I don’t believe she was motivated by greed or money; I think she was fully motivated by her ego. She couldn’t dare admit that she was in over her head, or that her company Theranos wasn’t able to do what she promised; she just kept lying to others (and possibly herself) in the hopes that everything would work itself out.
The story is at times unbelievable. The number of attorneys involved. The cloak and dagger way the company treated its ‘trade secrets.’ The threatening letters. The lawsuits. The firings of anyone who questions anything. To think that people act this way — and think it is justified — is distressing to say the least. And frankly, I reserve about as much disgust for the attorneys who did Elisabeth Holmes’s bidding as I do for Holmes and her C-suite colleagues. The way the tormented people is offensive.
One area I think could have been developed a little bit more is the exploration of what the failures of the blood testing did to people’s lives. Carreyrou does share some stories of those who were harmed — such as a woman who ended up with $3,000 in unnecessary medical bills — but that can at times get lost in the story. And of course many of the whistle-blowers were motivated by the danger that faulty blood testing can cause, but it still wasn’t necessarily woven in as much as I would have liked. But that’s a very minor quibble, because it’s definitely discussed.
A little more than halfway through the book, the author become part of the story. It’s a slightly dramatic moment, but I think it is handled very well. The investigation of the Wall Street Journal article that predates the book is a huge reason why Theranos has been sued and why some of its leadership have been charged with crimes. It would be impossible for him to stay out of it, and the book would have suffered greatly without his perspective being shared in this way.
There were many moment when I got so angry at the things people were getting away with, but the last couple of chapters — I mean, there are some serious just deserts being served. It’s chef’s kiss come to life.
Keep it / Pass to a Friend / Donate it / Toss it: Keep it. And probably listen again soon.
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LibraryThing member wellreadcatlady
Elizabeth Holmes is a con artist who was described as being the next Steve Jobs with her blood testing technology that would allow people to test their blood at home using a single drop of blood. Only problem was the technology didn't work, but that didn't stop Elizabeth from acting like everything
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was figured out to get people in investing in Theranos. Bad Blood goes into Elizabeth's history, how Theranos was built up, and the journalism work went into taking them down. I wanted more focus to be on the media that hyped up Elizabeth and her company, but also the process that went into taking her down. Instead the book goes on about the science of why the blood tests didn't work and how inappropriate Elizabeth behaved. Worth the read and is a great cautionary tale for investors and inventors. Show Less
LibraryThing member starkravingmad
Fascinating , true story of the lengths a narcissist will go to make protect a web of lies - while harming innumerable others along the way.
Also, an example of pack mentality investing. Frightening.
Also, an example of pack mentality investing. Frightening.
LibraryThing member waldhaus1
I recall first reading the authors WSJ article and being amazed that the Theranos had abandoned basic science so completely. I am tempted to believe of their money had been spent on science and research they might have come close to realizing a good part of their dream. It is hard to see what trade
The village of her non scientific backers is disheartening. And these are the people claiming to run the country.
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secrets they thought they were guarding. The village of her non scientific backers is disheartening. And these are the people claiming to run the country.
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LibraryThing member cmt100
A dense read--investigative journalism, after all--but absolutely fascinating. If you're thinking that CEO's of multinational corporations are smarter than the rest of us, this book is a reality check. The interesting thing is that in every organization that Elizabeth Holmes defrauded (including
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the United States Army), there was one person who smelled a rat. And couldn't get anybody to listen. Show Less
LibraryThing member justagirlwithabook
Oh, this one was a good one. Did it live up to the hype? Absolutely it did. It's one crazy story after another, and the crazier part was reading this knowing now that Theranos became what it was while I was in high school and in my early college years - and I was none the wise, so oblivious to that
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world in Silicon Valley (and not caring a bit because, high school and college). If you like a good piece of investigative journalism that'll take you on a whirlwind ride, this one's for you. Show Less
LibraryThing member elifkus
It's a very well written book. As Bill Gates said in his review, it's like a thriller. It was hard to put the book down.
Yet Elizabeth Holmes, and all the investors, and people who empower her, are banal to me. I work as a contractor in Turkey. I've worked in startups and corporate environments.
Having said that, I congratulate John Carreyrou for his journalism. It's people like him who make us hopeful for the future.
Yet Elizabeth Holmes, and all the investors, and people who empower her, are banal to me. I work as a contractor in Turkey. I've worked in startups and corporate environments.
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It's too familiar. Power- grabbers, wishful thinkers, people who don't really understand and pretend to be understanding... There are too many similar stories around us, they are just at different scales.Having said that, I congratulate John Carreyrou for his journalism. It's people like him who make us hopeful for the future.
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Awards
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — 2018)
Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year (Longlist — 2018)
IRE Awards (Winner — 2018)
Golden Poppy Book Award (Winner — 2018)
Publishers Weekly's Best Books of the Year (Nonfiction — 2018)
NPR: Books We Love (2018)
Boston Globe Best Book (Nonfiction — 2018)
Time Magazine's Best Books of the Year (Nonfiction — 2018)
Chicago Public Library Best of the Best: Adults (Selection — 2018)
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
2018
Physical description
7.72 inches
ISBN
9781509868087
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DDC/MDS
| 338.7 |