Chapters addressing Brock Turner, Jerry Sandusky, Tim Levine and Amanda Knox involve the higher education community while Florentino Aspillaga and Ana Montes reveal communication failures within our national intelligence agency. Gladwell’s story of Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme and the analyst, Harry Markopolos was very interesting.
The story of how a Quant was able to detect fraud on Wall Street never ceases to amaze me. Gladwell reveals how Markopolos’ early life set the foundation to discover Madoff’s fraud. Great story which Gladwell ties both Markopolos and Scott Carmichael (Defense Intelligence Agency who ultimately identified Montes) as Holy Fools….it’s not what you think.
Gladwell’s research in chapter ten regarding poet Sylvia Plath and suicide is impressive. His research revealing British Town Gas transition to natural gas did impact suicide rates. Revealing when compared to US rates 1900 to 1990. This reveals the American saga of the Golden Gate Bridge. This is his focus on coupling.
Part Five has stories on Plath set against the Kansas City Experiments of preventive patrol experiments [full report from the National Police Foundation]. Gladwell wraps this bow tightly into the concluding chapter on Sandra Bland. This tragedy is a result of miscommunications.