The non-fiction I’m reading lately is proving to me that real life is weirder than fiction. The world really is a dangerous place!
Bill Browder, the author of Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder and One Man’s Fight for Justice, discovers that his days of being a lucrative investment broker in Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union is about to come to an abrupt end when he’s forbidden re-entry into the country he calls his home.
Through Hermitage Capital Browder becomes a prominent shareholder in numerous Russian gas companies, but his trail of research brings him in direct conflict with corrupt bureaucrats, law enforcement and Putin himself. His offices are raided, he’s accused of tax evasion and ultimately his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, is brutally murdered by the Russian state and a warrant is issued for Browder’s arrest.
Of course I’ve condensed hundreds of pages of this crazy story into three paragraphs so I’m not even beginning to do this book justice. Ultimately Browder turns activist in defence of Sergei and his tireless advocacy results in the passing of the Magnisky Act by Barack Obama. The act authorizes the US government to sanction those who it sees as human rights offenders, freezing their assets, and ban them from entering the U.S.
If there is an interesting thing about this book it’s just how nuts the whole story is. Like really? This is how the world of international investment and finance works? I guess so. And Bill Browder, is at the centre of it from the beginning when he saw the opportunity the Russian market offered to investors like himself and his wealthy clients. There is no question, he’s a driven guy. He’s either making crazy amounts of money or avenging his friends death. This man is a risk taker no matter what he does and there is something heroic if not a little crazy about this story.
The other “elephant in the room” is Russia. Russia is just a bit creepy these days with it’s wanting to take over the world by destroying western democracies. What we see is just the tip of the iceberg. I would love to have dinner and few drinks with Rob Mueller (I know, he’d never talk but one can dream). According to Bill Browder, Russia is a thug state. And that’s probably something we should all be just a little worried about. I give this book a thumbs up!
Condofire 