Edwin Reingold's foot-in-door account of the rise of Toyota, Japan's most successful company bar none, represents hard-scrabble reporting at its factual best.
The downside is that it's more expensive, uncomfortable to wear for long periods of time and has to be custom fit, Reingold said, so it's suited for people working in high-risk laboratories.
Having spent many years as Time magazine's bureau chief in Tokyo and having done a stint in Detroit, Mr Reingold knows cars and Japan with an intimacy and insight few academic biographers and historians can match.