It almost has a memoir component because Pringle is our guide to the story. Part nonfiction thriller and part true crime memoir, this was gripping, brilliant and illuminating all at once. The writing style is very journalistic, which I loved. It's tense, relevant, to the point but also displays the humanity of the people involved. The ones who have any humanity, that is. The book was only partly an expose of Dr Puliafito's roller coaster ride right off the rails from genius innovator and doctor to drug addled sugar daddy. We get all the salacious and head shaking details of how this senior citizen decided to rocket his way into retirement by indulging in prostitutes and meth. But what we also get is the story of a dogged journalist who wanted to expose this respected, upstanding leader in the USC community for the aberration that he was but also to show how an institution like USC makes its own rules and throws ethics right out the window in the pursuit of money, power and prestige. The details of the main case and the other scandals (like Varsity Blues) plaguing the university were very compelling, although not surprising. The politics and drama of the process of getting the article published reminded me of watching Newsroom.