Sally Denton traces four generations of the Bechtel family, whose construction and engineering firm has built dams, pipelines, nuclear plants, and cities across the globe while maintaining unusual secrecy for a company of its size and influence. Denton, an investigative journalist, examines how Bechtel grew from railroad construction in the West to become the largest privately held construction company in the world. The book documents the company's relationships with government: contracts for the Hoover Dam, the San Francisco Bay Area's BART system, the reconstruction of Iraq, and nuclear facilities whose costs repeatedly exceeded estimates. Denton traces the 'revolving door' through which Bechtel executives moved into government positions--including George Shultz and Caspar Weinberger--and returned to profit from policies they had shaped. The family's deliberate avoidance of publicity makes researching them difficult; Denton pieces together their story from litigation records, government investigations, and the accounts of critics and competitors. The book raises questions about private power: how a single family's decisions shaped infrastructure that millions depend upon, how military and corporate interests aligned through contracts awarded without competitive bidding, and how democracy functions when major actors operate beyond public scrutiny.