Excellent... Longmate's achievement in this moving history, like Henry Mayhew's in London Labour and the London Poor, has been to record the experiences of people who, friendless and despairing, otherwise left few traces of themselves behind

Norman Longmate has a reputation for careful research among original documents and a lively sense of anecdote, and this history of the Victorian workhouse amply demonstrates both qualities

It is a strength of Norman Longmate's finely researched book that it is filled with such human reminders that the people who lived out meagre lives behind the high walls were living beings

A delight to read, a literary triumph sparkling with moments of real humour and compassion

Piers Brendon's long book has such brilliance and narrative power, and contains so much fascinating detail, that reading it has all the excitement of novel

Terrifying and superbly told

Genius

Compelling and horrifying

A more than worthy successor to Liar's Poker ... if you want to know about the origins of the credit crunch, and the extraordinary cast of misfits, visionaries and chancers who made money from the crash, there's no more readable account

A triumph ... riveting ... a genuine page-turner

The very best book about this whole affair

If you read only one book about the causes of the recent financial crisis, let it be Michael Lewis's The Big Short

In the hands of Michael Lewis, anything is possible ... if you want to know how a nation lost its financial mind - and have a good laugh finding out - this is the book to read.

Magnificent ... a perfect storm of brilliant writer meeting big subject.

Brilliant

In this riveting, well-written expose, Shaxson goes deep into the largely unexamined realm of offshore money. In the process, he reveals that this shadow world is no mere sideshow, but is troublingly central to modern finance, with the US and the UK as leaders. The resulting abuses are widespread, ranging from tax revenue stripping from African nations to individuals and corporations escaping enforcement and accountability. A must read for anyone who wants to understand the hidden reasons why financial services firms have become so powerful and impossible to reform

They who sold us globalisation as a way of the whole world getting richer with fair rules, cheated us by letting the rich and powerful go "offshore". This gripping exposé should help end the scandal

Possibly the most important political book that I have read since The Spirit Level

He has prised the lid off an important and terrifying can of worms

Lively and well written book

A welcome account of how the sun is never allowed to set on the British empire's old islands, whose fiscal pirates hoard the tax-free treasures of the rich

Shaxson delves into capitalism's secret nooks and tells us about how a culture of secrecy can perpetuate itself. Very interesting

A compelling read [...] an important and very much a live topic, it'll take you a few hours to read the book but it will be a worthwhile investment of time

What makes this such a good read for the layman is that the author employs all his journalistic skill (he used to work at Reuters) to illustrate his arguments and uses real examples to real examples to illustrate complex issues

This book is a must-read for anyone who wants to understand the world we live in

This engrossing book about the offshore banking racket, with its eye-opening scrutiny of tax havens and the suited scoundrels who profit from them, will make you think again about the murkier side of the City...This first-rate forensic work ends with a plea that the closed City "must be abolished and submerged into a...fully democratic London"

[An] informed polemic against finance capital

Now more than a decade old, this is still the best introduction to the world of tax havens