So after the exams, I finally had time once again to read a few books. Typically of me I sought out the business section of Hughes & Hughes and picked the first thing with Wall Street in the title (fairly predictable I am!)
Anyways on this occasion it was Jordan Belfort The Wolf of Wall Street that got my euro into the till. I bought it in a rush on the premise that it was a novel… such was the ridiculousness of the synopsis on the backcover.
The book is in fact the memoir of Mr Belfort who accumulated a fortune of $100m whilst still in his twenties on Wall Street. Long story short - he set up pump and dump stock manipulation schemes through use of his firm and successfully dodged the law for several years until eventually he got caught and ended up in jail. In addition to a four year jail spell, he was fined the nice sum of $110m… hence the book.
In the book he recounts the story of his rise and that of his firm whilst peppering the storyline with his various addictions along the way - coke, quaaludes, sex etc. By the end of the book, one feels utterly no sympaty for Jordan as he comes accross as an intensely immoral characther. Such are the vileness of his various claims, that at points one questions was the whole thing indeed made up.
The book reminded me of Catch Me if You Can, Blow, The Bonfire of the Vanities and Rough Trader all mixed together. Unfortunately this time out I just could’nt identify with the protagomist. That said it’s definitely worth a read and it’s no surprise Martin Scorsese and Leonardo Di Caprio have been tipped to bring the story to the big screen.
