It's the battle of the books about Bernard Madoff! Sure, there are a lot of them—last week, the NY Times' Michiko Kakutani reviewed two of 'em, one by an investigative reporter and the other by a journalist—but neither probably delve into details about the Ponzi schemer's, uh, equipment. The Daily News has excerpts of Sheryl Weinstein's Madoff tell-all—Weinstein says she had an affair with him—including "When we made love, I was on fire" and "This man was not well-endowed."
Other things from Weinstein's Madoff's Other Secret: She smoked pot with him before sex (apparently something he also did with wife Ruth) and nicknamed him "Winky Dink"... because he blinked a lot. Which makes Jerry Openheimer's Madoff and the Money—excerpted in the Wall Street Journal— seem subtle.
Openheimer writes that employees loved Madoff: "They thought of Bernie almost like a father figure, a messiah, and most felt secure that they'd have a very pleasant retirement," and he rarely fired people. One employee, "We were always like one big, happy family. Bernie was our god, a wonderful boss, eccentric, sometimes scary eccentric, but still wonderful. He was a stand-up guy." But when Madoff's scam was revealed, "As one longtime employee sadly observes, '12/11 was our own 9/11.' Bernie and Ruth Madoff were about to become as controversial a couple as Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and as infamous as Bonnie and Clyde."
And here's a Ruth fun fact, via Oppenheimer's book as mentioned in Page Six: "He had affairs in the office. There were two women I know of. They were gorgeous. They were blond. They were young. They were like baby Ruths -- the same type as Ruth, with the same hair color and eye color."
