The Panama papers Breaking the story of how the rich & powerful hide their money

When the Panama Papers were made public in 2016, they sent shock waves throughout the world. The breadth and depth of tax evasion by the rich and powerful was exposed, as was a corrupt system that enabled such deceit. Political leaders in multiple countries were embarrassed; some were forced to resign. All of this was the result of an unprecedented leak of 2.6 terabytes of data. Obermayer and Obermaier were journalists with Süddeutsche Zeitung, part of an international network of journalists to break the story. Bringing such a major story to book form in such a short time (and then translating it from the original German) is a challenge, but this text serves as an excellent explanation of the investigative work and the findings. The book is useful to scholars interested in investigative journalism and tax evasion. With all the different countries and players involved, it's a shame that the book lacks an index, but this shortcoming can be forgiven because of the immediacy of publication. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through professionals. --Dom Caristi, Ball State University

A reporter at Munich's Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper gets an anonymous text message that asks, "Interested in data?" So begins the saga of the Panama Papers, the largest leak of information to journalists in history. Obermayer encourages his contact, "John Doe," whose disclosures pull back the curtain on the dealings of Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, which, over several decades, helped set up hundreds of thousands of shell companies for a global array of famous-and infamous-clients. The resulting investigation into 11.5 million documents, assisted by the International Consortium for Investigative Journalists, topples multiple political figures, including Iceland's prime minister, and implicates public figures and major companies from around the world. Despite the challenge of summing up the work of over 320 reporters from over 70 countries, the coauthors, both Süddeutsche Zeitung reporters, present a straightforward account that involves German banks, soccer superstar Lionel Messi, African dictators, China's new elite, and Vladimir Putin's inner circle. This book is a fascinating first look at a scandal that may be the beginning of the end of the opaque and dodgy offshore finance industry. (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.