“As journalist Michael Gross shows in his history of the gentlemen and geniuses, barbarians and social-climbers who have run the Met since it was founded in 1870, proximity to the glorious art of humanity doesn’t necessarily improve the humans who document, collect and display it,” writes Maria Puente in USA Today. ” Great collections aren’t built on generosity and genteel spirit alone — try egomania and tax deductions. Also fraud, theft, greed, arrogance, anti-Semitism and snobbery… What a passel of pooh-bahs they were. Morgans and Rockefellers, Astors and Wrightsmans, Sulzbergers and Lehmans bestride the boardroom, while curators and directors labor (and plot) in the galleries… Gross demonstrates he knows his stuff. It’s a terrific tale… gossipy, color-rich, fact-packed … What Gross reveals is stuff that more people should know.”