Up Close and All In teems with its star’s name. “You’ve got to talk to John Mack,” a Duke University bigwig tells corporate recruiters. “Goddamn it,” an early Wall Street coworker says after seeing him in action, “John Mack just did that!” One veteran tells a big-time rival he’s now No. 2, behind a new No. 1: “John Mack!” When he lets a colleague take the bigger bedroom at the Dolder Grand in Zurich, their German-accented concierge announces: “Herr Mack, you are a true gentleman.” Then, after leaving Morgan Stanley amid a power struggle in 2001 and returning in 2005 as the boss, his colleagues greet him with howls: “Mack! Mack! Mack!”
The memoir (Simon Element, $28.99) serves up a rare opportunity to hear power’s unvarnished internal monologue. It is an atlas of Wall Street ego, mapping the topography of self-regard, and a vivid guide to the kind of executives who pride themselves on wearing Savile Row suits made by tailors in business before Napoleon lost at Waterloo. They pull strings on hospital boards, have regular tables at French restaurants, can get coach Mike Krzyzewski on the phone, golf at clubs you can’t get into, and have to be reminded to see their kids.
Mack’s book is also an account of Wall Street’s fateful growth from a staid business of quiet corporate advisors to a multi-trillion-dollar industry of globe-trotting trading giants that became too big to fail. Mack, who led Morgan Stanley into the global financial crisis and says the firm was a few hours or so away from bankruptcy, takes responsibility for being too aggressive. At the same time, he writes that he wouldn’t change a thing.
