Clean Sweep: The Inside Story of the Zzzz Best Scam... One of Wall Street's Biggest Frauds

by Barry Minkow

The 1986 headlines proclaimed 20-year-old Barry Minkow a phenomenon as he took his multimillion dollar carpet cleaning firm public. Just one year later the newspapers told a different story, one of inconceivable fraud and embezzlement. Now, for the first time, Minkow tells his own story, from success to corruption to his life-changing experience in prison.

244 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1995

Reviews

[Iain Hamill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story, fascinating personality. Spent a few hours down some interesting rabbit holes reading more recent articles. Hope he sees some sense.

[Dale · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading the book although Minkow is clearly a disturbed person. What surprised me is that he was cheating from early in his life. It was clear that being the best, and doing anything to be the best, is a way of life for him. Of course, he feigns reform at the end of the book, but we know how that turned out.

What stuck with me the most was that, as a young man, he couldn't enjoy sporting events because the crowd was cheering for someone other than him. That's a phenomenon that never occurred to me.

The fact of his subsequent second conviction many years later did not affect my enjoyment of the book. It's always interesting to read how a fraudster thinks. You just have to take it all with a grain of salt, because fraudsters lie. Imagine that.