BREAKING GLASS

A successful Wall Street financier chronicles her rise through the ranks in this memoir.

Chadwick has spent many of her 75 years climbing the corporate ladder in the financial world, breaking glass ceilings along the way. She chronicles that journey—as well as a childhood lived in what she describes as a religious cult—in this solidly-written (if oddly unmoving) look at a figure Jack Welch once called “the smartest woman on Wall Street.” The author’s rise in the financial world is well documented here—a success, Chadwick states, that came despite her sheltered and bizarre upbringing. This narrative charts her rapid ascent from secretarial school and an early career as a stockbroker in Boston and Philadelphia to eventually becoming an executive at Citibank in New York. Along the way, she rekindled a relationship with her mother (also a member of the cult), traveled the world, had a number of mentors in finance, forged a handful of good friendships, married, had children at 44, and retired at 51. The message? With hard work and planning, you can have it all, even if the odds are stacked against you early on in life (and even if you must confront gender-specific obstacles, including sexual assault, along the way). Chadwick can write, and, considering the drama-filled topics she discusses, her story should feel more compelling. The lack of reader engagement may stem from the book’s breakneck speed; worldwide financial meltdowns are covered in a few paragraphs, and even the origins of “the witch of Wall Street” moniker are almost non-existent. (There’s one scene, on a single page, in which Chadwick acknowledges her style could be a little prickly: “As I gained experience in the cutthroat world of portfolio management, I became increasingly demanding of those on whom I relied for information,” she writes. “What I neglected to appreciate was the often intimidating ferocity of my passion.”) Ironically, that’s what’s missing from the narrative—the subject matter is compelling, but a bit more passion would have made this memoir something special.

A memoir chock-full of dramatic turns that remains disappointingly unaffecting.