Conflicted

by Michael Culp

Follows David Meadows, Director of Research at a large Wall Street brokerage firm, as he puts into play a special assignment from his CEO that will generate twenty million dollars, if he can make things go his way.

Genres: Fiction

419 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2003

Reviews

[Jerry Briggs]

I just finished this book. I was Impressed and looked it up here to see what others thought of it.
I was very surprised to find no "5" ratings. I rated it, in my own list that I keep, at 4.5
I would estimate that of the 50+ books I read each year, less than one or two ever hit that high a mark.
If I LOVE a book, I will rate it for myself at 4.0 out of 5, and when deciding what to read next, I often check my list to find an author with previous 4.0's.
I researched here because I wanted to find the names of other books by Culp. Apparently, this was it. I am sorry for that: he had a really interesting look at the problems a manager has with the various personalities within a sizeable company. His hero takes them all on, and puts up with more than you could imagine in his quest to help his own income for the year(s) ahead.
I read this in probably four days: it was bought as a cast-off from my local library, where I buy books by the tons. This book deserves to be read, and Culp should take the time to write another. It is, as one review pointed out, undoubtedly reflections on similar things that have happened in his own life, managing people, and seeing what is required of highly-paid prima-donnas!
I fully recommend this book if you are a person that enjoys or enjoyed business and managing people and their odd quirks. It shows that there are all kinds, and some make you want to question why a firm has tolerated such people!

[gekko100]

Culp belongs to the small but growing niche of ex-investment bankers who have earned a fat pile of cash by their mid-30s in the dog-eat-dog smash and grab world of high finance and then, in a self-indulgent effort to find a sense of meaning in their lives, read a couple of John Grisham novels and decide to spew out one of their own.

The fact that Culp's imagination doesn't run any further than a story which is a thinly-veiled pastiche of events from his own career (he even throws himself in as an oh-so-clever cameo) is indicative of his mediocre literary talents.

The sad thing is that saps like me -- eager to devour any material, even fictional, that purports to relate to the industry in which we are about to seek employment -- come along and read books like this. Sigh.

Bottom line: Tripe -- of the absolute kind.

[Akirish52]

I believe it is as much fact as fiction. Dirty, dirty Wall Street!