The Reichmanns' astonishing saga began in Hungary and swept through Austria, France, and North Africa before achieving apotheosis in Canada, where the secretive, ultra-orthodox Jewish family founded Olympia & York Development, the greatest real estate empire in the world at its peak in the 1980s. The company's collapse into bankruptcy in 1992 is a modern cautionary tale of biblical proportions, rendered by business journalist Anthony Bianco in lavish detail backed by formidable research. Interviews with various family members enable the author to plumb personalities as well as profit motives; their decision to cooperate is justified by his careful fairness.