Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Received: Penguin Random House Canada
Published: May 21st, 2018
Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
Recommended Age: 16+
Genres & Themes: Nonfiction, Business, True Crime, Science

REVIEW:

A company that set out to save lives… only to put those same lives in danger with its malfunctioning technology.

What a scary and fascinating story. It’s hard to believe that Theranos really happened because you think that nowadays it’s easy to spot liars and lying technologies… but it’s not that easy after all, especially if the person duping you is as charismatic as this Elizabeth Holmes is.

But the main reason why it took a VERY long time for people to catch on that Theranos was doing more harm than good was that people WANTED to believe in the product. If someone is creating a new game and trying to fool you that the game works when it doesn’t, you have doubts pretty early on. But then again, a game is unlikely to change your life like this medical machine promised to do.

I, myself, wanted Elizabeth Holmes’s idea to work because how amazing would it have been to have results pretty much instantly and get rid of big scary needles? Pretty darn mind-blowingly amazing. But alas, Ms. Holmes was in no way ready to compromise. She was a CEO alright… but not a good one. She lied. She hid. She shut down ideas that could have actually made Theranos’ technology work after all. It’s frustrating really. She just couldn’t let go of her idea of making those machines available in people’s houses and miniaturizing medical technology.

It took me almost a week to get through this read because it’s a THICK story. It may only have 300 pages but these are PACKED with information and characters. It spans over ten years! But it was hard not to pick it up again every time I needed to put it down because it’s more than just about business and crime—there is so much drama and hope this story could easily be turned into a TV series!

lolareviewer