Why are people successful? For centuries, humankind has grappled with this question, searching for the secret to accomplishing great things. In this stunning new book, Malcolm Gladwell takes us on an invigorating intellectual journey to show us what makes an extreme overachiever.

He reveals that we pay far too much attention to what successful people are like, and too little attention to where successful people are from. Gladwell examines how the careers of Bill Gates and the performance of world-class football players are alike; why so many top lawyers are Jewish; why Asians are good at maths and why it is correct to say that the mathematician who solved Fermat's Theorem is not a genius.

Like Blink, this is a landmark work that will simultaneously delight and illuminate.