How I Caused the Credit Crunch, By Tetsuya Ishikawa

Tetsuya Ishikawa was an investment banker who sold derivatives and subprime loans; he was made redundant in 2008, and wrote this semi-fictionalised account of what it was like to be a master of the universe.

If, like me, you know absolutely nothing about this subject, then you'll at least start by being interested in learning how young men could make millions by buggering up the global economy. But Ishikawa has little talent for explanation: unless sentences such as "Under the 1988 accord, banks had to hold 8% of the total investment amount in any MBS or CDO AAA tranche as regulatory capital" already make sense to you, his book won't leave you any the wiser.

Chapters on the bankers' leisure pursuits (cocaine, fine wines, prostitutes) might have offered more human interest, but only if seen through sharper, more satirical eyes. The style would suit an article in a men's magazine about bankers' excesses, where the aim was to arouse envy and admiration, but the insights are too banal and the prose too colourless and clichéd to maintain the interest over 344 pages.