(2009) The Informant: (Movie Tie-in Edition) A True Story... (Random House Movie Tie-In Books) By Kurt Eichenwald. (ISBN: 0767931254 / 0-7679-3125-4)

Book Description: Broadway Books (A Division of Random House Publishing Group), New York, NY, U.S.A., 2009. Reprint from 2001 (Movie Tie-in Edition) Paperback. Number line on copyright page states: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1. 629 pages, 5.25" x 8" tall, 1.5" thick. New copy - Never read - Not price clipped. Beautiful gift quality copy of a soft cover book.

Book Condition: Brand New. Price on back cover reads $17.00 US.

Dust Jacket Condition: No DJ, this is a soft cover book.

About This Book: The FBI was ready to take down America's most politically powerful corporation. But there was one thing they didn't count on.

So reads the cover of this high-powered true crime story, an accurate teaser to a bizarre financial scandal with more plot twists than a John Grisham novel. In 1992 the FBI stumbled upon Mark Whitacre, a top executive at the Archer Daniels Midland corporation who was willing to act as a government witness to a vast international price-fixing conspiracy. ADM, which advertises itself as The Supermarket to the World, processes grains and other farm staples into oils, flours, and fibers for products that fill America's shelves, from Jell-O pudding to StarKist tuna. The company's chairman and chief executive, Dwayne Andreas, was so influential that he introduced Ronald Reagan to Mikhail Gorbachev, and it was his maneuvering that ensured that high fructose corn syrup would replace sugar in most foods (ever wondered why Coke and Pepsi don't taste quite like they used to?). There were two mottoes at ADM: The competitors are our friends, and the customers are our enemies and We know when we're lying. And lie they did. With the help of Whitacre, the FBI made hundreds of tapes and videos of ADM executives making price-fixing deals with their corrivals from Japan, Korea, and Canada, all while drinking coffee and laughing about their crimes. The tapes should have cinched the case, but there was one problem: Their star witness was manipulative, deceitful, and unstable. Nothing was as it seemed, and the investigation into one of the most astounding white-collar crime cases in history had only just begun.

Synopsis: An investigative reporter offers a true story of corruption and crime as he profiles a senior executive within a politically powerful American company, Archer Daniels Midland, who serves as a government informant to uncover a vast conspiracy while embezzling millions of dollars from the company for himself. Reissue. (A Warner Bros. film, written by Scott Z. Burns, directed by Steven Soderbergh, releasing March 2009, starring Matt Damon.)

Reviews:

"In this true account that has more spy action than some Tom Clancy novels, we get double-crossing, dirty dealing, lying, conniving, and wiretapping...and that's just the FBI agent and his informant....The phantasmagoric story behind the so-called "Supermarket to the world, and it will certainly change the way you look at your grocery bill. It may also change the way you think about your neighbors when a strange car pulls into their driveway."" --bookpage.com, September 2000.

Kurt Eichenwald, an investigative reporter, covered the story for The New York Times and interviewed more than 100 participants in the case. He methodically records the six-year investigation, leaving no plot twist or tape transcript unexplored. While his primary focus is on deconstructing the disturbed Whitacre and revealing the malleability of truth, the portrait of ADM (and even the Justice Department) is damning enough to make anyone a cynic. --Lesley Reed.

About The Author: Kurt Alexander Eichenwald (born June 28, 1961), an American writer and investigative reporter formerly with The New York Times and later with Condé Nast's business magazine, Portfolio. Eichenwald had been employed by the Times since 1986 and primarily covered Wall Street and corporate topics such as insider trading, accounting scandals, and takeovers, but also wrote about a range of issues including terrorism, the Bill Clinton pardons controversy, Federal health care policy and sexual predators on the Internet. He is the author of three bestselling books, one of which, The Informant, was made into The Informant!, a motion picture.

Early career: After college, in 1983, Eichenwald worked as an intern with The Washington Monthly, and later that same year joined the speechwriting staff of a presidential candidate. He left that position in 1984, and over the next year, worked as was a writer-researcher for CBS News in the Election and Survey Unit. He joined The Times in 1985 as a news clerk for Hedrick Smith, who was chief Washington correspondent. When Mr. Smith began writing his book The Power Game, Eichenwald became his research assistant, leaving in 1986 to become associate editor at The National Journal in Washington. During those years, he was a frequent contributor to the Times op-ed page, writing exclusively about political issues.

Eichenwald returned to The Times later in 1986 as a news clerk for the national desk in New York, participating in the paper’s writing program for aspiring reporters. By 1988, Eichenwald had been named the Times’ Wall Street reporter.

Eichenwald’s arrival on Wall Street coincided with the explosion of white collar criminal investigations, and his coverage of finance soon began to resemble the crime beat. He wrote about the stock trading scandals involving speculator Ivan Boesky and junk bond king Michael Milken, as well as the Treasury markets scandal at Salomon Brothers. He also covered the excesses of the takeover era, including the biggest deal of the time, the acquisition of RJR Nabisco by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Company.

In 1992, Eichenwald’s role at The Times split. He began writing the paper’s Market Place column, focusing primarily on disclosure failures by public companies. He also began a multi-year investigation into a series of frauds at Prudential Securities and its parent, Prudential Insurance. His reporting led to the dismissals and resignation of several Prudential executives and brokers.

The Informant: In 1998, Eichenwald was honored again, being named to the Times’ senior reporter program. During these years, Eichenwald also reported on the unfolding price-fixing scandal at Archer Daniels Midland. While that reporting was never his primary project, Eichenwald used the story as the basis of his second bestselling book, The Informant. That book was proclaimed by The New York Times Book Review as "one of the best nonfiction books of the last decade." Eichenwald subsequently sold the rights for the film adaptation. The movie, a dark comedy, was released in 2009, starring Matt Damon and directed by Steven Soderbergh.

While still a business book, The Informant was much more of a police procedural than any of Eichenwald’s other work, depicting the inner workings of the FBI in detail. That signaled his coming transition, as he moved away from traditional business stories into a wider assortment of investigations.

Education and early life: He graduated from St. Mark's School of Texas in Dallas and Swarthmore College, where he was a founder of Sixteen Feet, an a cappella vocal octet.

Family: Eichenwald is married to Dr. Theresa Pearse, an internist. They have three children, Sam, Adam, and Ryan.

Source: Read more at Wikipedia.