Private Empire

The oil giant ExxonMobil makes more money annually than the GDP of most countries; has greater sway than US embassies abroad; and spends more on lobbying than any other corporation. Yet to outsiders it is a mystery. In Private Empire award-winning reporter Steve Coll tells the truth about the world's most powerful and shadowy company.From the Exxon Valdez accident in 1989 to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, via Moscow, the swamps of the Niger Delta and the halls of Congress, he reveals a story of dictators, oligarchs, civil war, blackmail, secrecy and ruthlessness. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and newly declassified documents, this is a chilling portrait of unchecked power.'The definitive work on its subject . . . at every stop there are vivid anecdotes, sharp insights and telling details.' Ed Crooks, Financial Times'Magisterial . . . a revealing history of our time.' New York Review of Books'Meticulous, multi-angled and valuable . . . Coll's prose sweeps the earth like an Imax camera.' Dwight Garner, The New York Times'Jaw-dropping reading.' Kirkus Reviews

“Magisterial ... a revealing history of our time”

-- Bill McKibben New York Review of Books
Meticulously researched and elegantly written, it is likely to be the definitive work on its subject for many years to come. Steve Coll ... is honest about Exxon's strengths as well as its flaws, and presents both sides of the arguments with scrupulous even-handedness ... At every stop there are vivid anecdotes, sharp insights and telling details -- Ed Crooks Financial Times
Masterful ... Coll's in-depth reporting, buttressed by his anecdotal prose, make Private Empire a must-read ... [His] portrait of ExxonMobil is both riveting and appalling... Yet Private Empire is not so much an indictment as a fascinating look into American business and politics San Francisco Chronicle
Meticulous, multi-angled and valuable ... Coll's prose sweeps the earth like an Imax camera -- Dwight Garner New York Times
A thorough, sobering study of the pernicious consolidation of Big Oil ... jaw-dropping reading Kirkus Reviews

Steve Coll is most recently the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning bestseller Ghost Wars. He also won a 1990 Pulitzer Prize for explanatory journalism. He covered Afghanistan as the Washington Post's South Asia bureau chief between 1989 and 1992 and has been the Post's managing editor since 1998. He is the author of five books, including On the Grand Trunk Road and The Taking of Getty Oil. He lives with his wife and three children in Maryland.

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