On A.J.’s (1) by “similar change” (and “parallel” story) I meant in the same direction not so much order of magnitude and (2) of the books you mention, I’ve studied Cooper’s carefully and regard it highly (perhaps it warrants a brief review that I’ll provide if time permits).

Which other books touching on the crisis do you recommend? Janet Tavakoli’s Structured Finance & Collateralized Debt Obligations, 2d ed.(2008), remains my own favorite to date, both for the technical explanations of the instruments and her withering descriptions of financial culture. George Cooper’s The Origin of Financial Crises (2008) is interesting especially from the central banking side of the picture, and his critique of the EMH. More on the legal side, though not exclusively about finance or corporations, La gouvernance (2003) by Philippe Moreau Defarges in the Que sais-je series is a very sober critique of the idea of governance generally. And Rawi Abdelal’s Capital Rules (2007) describes the 1980-1990s history of the international regulations liberalizing cross-border capital movements and the hitherto ignored role of French Socialists therein (though this last is a pretty dry read, IMHO).