Recently finished Bad Blood, the story of Theranos. I had seen the 60 Minutes on Theranos, followed along in the Wall Street Journal and felt as though I understood the level of fraud.

I was incredibly wrong. This impeccably researched story has a level of deception that is shocking. What began as a vision and then turned into an over promised device eventually led to fraudulent and misleading results that impacted lives.

The book is a quick read or listen as I just couldn’t put it down. All the villains, duped investors and whistleblowing heroes are covered in extreme yet convincing detail. Retailers ranging from Safeway to Walgreens believed Theranos would drive their next decade of growth and separation from the likes of Kroger and CVS. Investors ranging from Rupert Murdoch and Carlos Slim lost millions on the fear of missing out on the next Steve Jobs.

The current state of private company valuations and Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google excitement reminds me to look past the smoke and mirrors of any pitch, marketing campaign or investor book. Sometimes things truly aren’t as good as they may seem.

I highly encourage anyone to have a read...or at least a listen to Bad Blood.