Hard News by Seth Mnookin

I finally picked up Hard News by Seth Mnookin off my bookshelf, and really was fascinated by his re-telling of the Jayson Blair fiasco at The New York Times. Because I work in journalism, I followed the story very closely as it was happening back in 2003, when Blair got busted for fabricating news stories for the NYT. In fact, I followed the story so closely that I thought, "There is no way Mnookin is going to be able to tell me more than I've already read about this."
Well, I was wrong. Maybe it's that time has gone by and I've forgotten details. But more likely is that Mnookin was able to distance himself from the whole mess and then write a compelling narrative of a Newspaper Gone Wrong.
I was also fascinated by Mnookin's exhaustive sourcing. He often gives credit within the text when he refers to others's reportage. Copious end notes further explain what he got from his own interviews and what came from other sources. The book's index is excellent as well. (A rant for another day: the horror of substandard indexes.) Finally, in the paperback edition I have, he lists corrections to the hardback edition. I don't think I've ever seen that; it smacks of accountability and accuracy.
I suppose some of this was a defensive necessity given the subject matter. Most of his sources are reporters and editors from the nation's preeminent newspaper. I imagine they would eat you for lunch or at least trash your reputation for all eternity if you got things wrong. But wow, it's nice for a reader like me to be able to examine the sourcing to that degree.