The Billionaire Who Wasn’t

A Businessweek and The Economist Best Book of the Year

“Chuck Feeney is a remarkable role model, and the ultimate example of giving while living.” 

“Chuck Feeney's success in business, coupled with his commitment to philanthropy, stands as living proof that it is possible to do well and do good at the same time.” 

“An engrossing look at an unusual, influential philanthropist... A superbly written, detailed look at Chuck Feeney, who gave away billions. Reads like fiction.” 

“A rollicking story of how, by stealth, an Irish American obsessed by secrecy built a business empire and revolutionised philanthropy.” 

“Feeney's beneficence already ranks among the grandest of any living American and may someday make him the most generous American philanthropist of all time.” 

“A gripping read.” 

“The riveting story of a billionaire who gave it all away disturbs deeply rooted assumptions about wealth and power... What makes him so fascinating, and gives such richness to O'Clery's brilliantly engrossing account, is that Feeney both embodies and rebukes the American Dream. O'Clery turns his prodigious research and mastery of sometimes intricate detail into a tight, pacey, crystal-clear narrative... An epic tale.” 

“You may never read a book as uplifting as Conor O’Clery’s The Billionaire Who Wasn’t: How Chuck Feeney Secretly Made and Gave Away a Fortune. In vivid, unvarnished prose, The Billionaire Who Wasn’t recounts Feeney’s meteoric rise from blue-collar beginnings in Elizabeth, N.J., to a perch as one of America’s titans of commerce, head of Duty Free Shoppers, the largest liquor retailer in the world.” 

“For America’s new generation of Internet and private equity billionaires, this is an exemplary tale.” 

“If [O’Clery’s] compelling narrative becomes a blue-print for future efforts to record the life stories of philanthropists, then the reading public might become far more aware of the major donors who have existed in their midst. O’Clery’s account of how Charles ‘Chuck’ Feeney rose from a blue-collar New Jersey neighbourhood to immense riches as founder of global retail enterprise, Duty Free Shoppers, and then gave almost every cent away, reads like a cross between a whodunnit and an airport business guru book.” 

“An interesting and well-written book defining a man whom most of us have never heard of; purchase where there is interest in relation to business and philanthropy.” 

“A smart business book detailing some vicissitudes of retailing, wrapped in a vivid biography of an engaging tycoon.”