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

It is the most entertaining and nerve-breaking book I have ever read in my entire life. Every chapter is full of evil acts. After reading this, you will still feel overwhelmed by the chills you had while you were reading. Elizabeth Holms, with her company Theranos valued at $9B in 2015, is the most audacious liar in the Silicon Valley startup history. By early 2017, the value of Theranos became zero, and in June 2018, she was indicted on federal wire fraud charges. Pulizer prize -winning investigative reporter, John Carreyrou's narration completes suspense to readers and the severity of the truth.  

Evil 1: Elizabeth Holms

Needless to say, or should I say needleless to say, the first person and the biggest culprit is the CEO of of Theranos. She is the world most talented salesperson. To start with, her board of directors are all-star board - Larry Ellizon, Tim Draper, Don Lucas, Henry Kissinger, William Perry, George P. Shultz to name a few. Her ability to recruit such famous people is one key amazing daunting sales ability, however her ability to keep deceiving them such a long time even without any successful 'outcome (core skill)' is another. It is simply unbelievable magnitude of lying. She even commercialized the testing with Walgreen & Safeway. The test results impacted millions of people, some of which seriously jeopardized the health of patients. She kept lying to people and mass media, in interviews, in forums, in conferences, without any evidence.  What made her to be her? Her greed? People easily believing in her? America needing a female business icon? Her boy friend, Sunny Balawi? 





Evil 2: Ramesh Sunny Balwani. 

He is the Black knight and boy friend of Elizabeth Holms. He was 37 when he met Elizabeth. Her age was only 18 years old. Usually successful CEO has their right man. The CEO and their partners tend to balance out as their core strengths complement each other. Any company needs those balanced leaders to truly grow. Bill Gates had Steve Ballmer. Steve Jobs had Tim Cook. It appears that Elizabeth had Sunny. Sunny is an experienced entrepreneur, having sold his company Commerce.com right before dot com burst. While he does not have any single experience in medical field, he wielded his connection power to rule Theranos, and did all of the dirty work for her. Elizabeth hires people; he fires people. He travels together with Elizabeth and lies in meetings together. In the end, he was deserted by Elizabeth in 2015 when John's investigation was getting traction. He is the partner in crime. He may have encouraged Elizabeth all along.

Evil 3: Boies Schiller 

One of the most successful law firm in America, Boies Schiller, got into Theranos's case, and their evil ways were in part exposed in this book. Once you are their target, I don't think you can truly escape from their mouse trap. It is like they have a endless way of tracking down people that are helping John Carreyrou with his investigation. They would have people tailgate the Theranos former employees such as Ericka Cheung, with threatening mails and the doctors who suspected the validity of the patients blood test results. Don't you become a lawyer in order to achieve Justice? Where is your justice? 

Hero 1: Brave former employees: Tyler Shultz, the grandson of George Shultz, the former secretary of state. Being worked in the lab and having documented on his concerns, he had the crucial information for John's investigation. He is considered the whistleblower. 

Hero 2: John Carreyrou