Lewis joined Salomon Brothers in the early eighties and was there for the great bond boom and Salomon Brothers was Bond Central. Remember the S&L crisis, leveraged buyouts, the junk bonds of Drexel's Michael Milken, the 1987 crash, etc? Well, Lewis saw it all, and the whole time, he was a moonlighting journalist and presumably therefore kept notes, etc, and we get this 1989 book.

This is fast reading though rich, believable though fantastic, good though profane, entertaining though distressing. I laughed a lot, though maybe I should have cried. Read anecdote after anecdote about boorish foulmouthed egomaniac gluttons who, apparently awash with adrenaline and testosterone, daily juggle hundreds of millions of dollars in pursuit of keeping their cut.

The title comes form one of the anecdotes regarding Gutfreund, chairman of Salomon Brothers, and Meriwether, one of his chief lieutenants and the best "trader" Lewis ever saw. Apologies for imperfect recall:

[G walks up to M]
	G: One hand, one million dollars, no tears.
[pause]
	M: If we're going to play, let's play for real money.
	   Ten million.
[G's turn to pause]
	G: [turns and walks away] You're crazy