Of course, no amount of self-deprecation can mask Gladwell’s phenomenal success. Since the 2000 publication of The Tipping Point, he has been less a journalist than, as Fast Company once deemed him, “a rock star, a spiritual leader, a stud.” Business executives seek him out for his insights, adoring fans stop him on the street to shake his hand, and other writers strive to emulate the genre he essentially pioneered—the idea-driven narrative that upends the way we think about everything from cigarettes to ketchup. “We get scores of proposals each year promising a Gladwellian take on the world,” says Shandler. “I don’t know any other author who has spawned that kind of adjective in nonfiction.” One Condé Nast editor, struggling to come up with
