Another Wonderful Secret: Infrequently Asked Questions About Jeffrey Epstein

A Q&A about my brand-new Q&A Epstein book, now available!

Greg Olear

May 27, 2026

Dude—didn’t you already write five of these Q&A pieces?

Yes.

And aren’t they available at PREVAIL, free of charge?

Also yes.

Then when on earth would anyone want this in book form?

Well, for one thing, the series is long. Too long to comfortably read on a phone or a laptop. Like, when I copy-pasted the five parts into a single document, it ran to 34,000 words.

That means nothing to me.

Dirty Rubles is 26,000 words. Rough Beast is 43,000 words—about the same length as On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence, the Pope’s new Encyclical. The Great Gatsby is something like 47,000 words.

Those are short books.

Yes. Short books—but very long Substack posts.

In 2024 and again in 2025, I’ve put out a short book based on pieces I’d written during the previous year. It makes the work seem less ephemeral. Sturdier.

But I must say, Another Wonderful Secret lends itself particularly well to this format.

Of course you would say that. You want people to buy it.

That’s true. I do indeed. Daddy needs some brand-new spats!

But objectively, it really does. When it’s laid out that way, you just plow right through it.

I could just print out all five of your posts on three-hole-punched paper and put it in a three-ring binder, and read it that way. What do you think about that, smart guy?

For sure, you could. But it’s more cost effective, and certainly less work, to just buy the book. The book also looks way nicer and feels better in your hands. Three-ring binders are aesthetically on par with DMV lobbies, the pile of broken shopping carts near the dumpsters behind your local supermarket, and Trump’s Presidential “Library.”

Also, it’s not exactly the same as the online series. I took out some stuff, put in other stuff, moved stuff around a bit, wrote a few introduction, and compiled a few pages of endnotes.

I’m not convinced. Any other reasons?

Honestly, I’m low-key afraid there’s going to be an electro-magnetic blip and all the digital files on earth will vanish. And I’m actively afraid the fascist oligarchs who own all the media will suck everything up into their data centers, put up a wall, and cut us off from the internet entirely.

Books are made of paper, and are flammable, true—but in certain ways, they are a lot harder to destroy.

Why did you call it Another Wonderful Secret? You didn’t use that title for any of the pieces.

“Infrequently Asked Questions About Jeffrey Epstein” is the subtitle of all five of the pieces. The actual title of each piece is derived from a quote—something someone else said or wrote about Epstein.

For example, Chapter Three is titled “As If In a Labyrinth.” That comes from a quote I found in a magazine article. The molecular biologist Richard Axel said it, talking about Epstein’s alleged genius: “He has enough information after fifteen minutes so that you can see his mind thrashing about, as if in a labyrinth.” I thought that was a ridiculous thing to say, and I wanted to highlight it. Also, labyrinth is a cool word that neatly conveys the byzantine aspect of Epstein’s network.

The title of the book, of course, comes from something Donald Trump wrote in Epstein’s Birthday Book: “May every day be another wonderful secret.”

What’s the deal with the cover?

I really didn’t want to have Epstein’s horrible face on the front. Just like I seldom use a photo of Donald for the PREVAIL pieces. I’m sick of looking at them. Even though it’s probably better for marketing purposes.

The cover image is one of the scanned documents in the Epstein Files. I believe it’s titles of various video cassettes. The “LSJ” stands for “Little St. James,” which is Epstein’s island.

The black is not a Photoshop paint-bucket black. It’s from the FBI’s scan, so it has some texture to it. I thought that looked cool.

What is the purpose of the book?

As I write in the introduction, it’s to paint as complete a portrait as possible of Jeffrey Epstein as I understand him, based on my years of research.

Dirty Rubles is a short introduction to Trump/Russia. The idea was, someone who wasn’t paying attention to the news could sit down with my book, read the whole thing in one sitting during a rainy afternoon, and walk away with a better understanding of what Donald still calls, incorrectly, a “hoax.”

Another Wonderful Secret is the same general idea. Someone who hasn’t been following the Epstein story can read the book one rainy afternoon, and walk away with a better understanding of the many, many facets of the Jeffrey Epstein story.

Is there a lot in there about the survivors?

Not really. Not because they’re not important—they very much are—or that their stories don’t deserve to be heard—they very much do. But there are writers better equipped to tell those stories, and they’ve been telling them more completely than I ever could.

With that said, you can’t write about Jeffrey Epstein and not talk about the monstrousness of the child sex trafficking, so I do discuss it. But my focus is more on his money, his intelligence ties, and his network. I try to delve into what gets under-reported.

Have you discussed this book anywhere?

I have! Matt Robison was kind enough to have me on his show yesterday afternoon, and we spent a good hour talking about my take on Epstein. Here is a clip:

You can watch the whole thing here:

Your publisher is Four Sticks Press.

Correct.

Isn’t that your company?

Also correct. Named for the Led Zeppelin song, which is itself a reference to the Four of Wands tarot—the card of celebration. Here’s the logo:

Why did you do that? Couldn’t you get a book deal?

I’m capable of having a major publishing house put out one of my books. Remember, HarperCollins published my first two novels.

The thing is—and I think this is one of the big challenges with long-form journalism—it takes months and months to put out a book with a traditional publisher. By the time it drops, more often than not, it’s too late to do much good.

The best, and funniest, example of that is Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson publishing their book about Joe Biden’s alleged senility after he’d already left office. But this happens a lot. Bob Woodward’s done it. Maggie Haberman. We all get mad—and rightly so—but that’s how the system works.

Traditional book publishers are wonderful in many ways. A good editor, for example, is worth her weight in gold. There are some amazing publicists I know who pitch me new books for my podcast. But all of that stuff takes time. Publishing operates on a nineteenth-century model. Still.

These days, the news moves too fast to wait around. Publishers have to be more nimble. They have to strike quickly. Through Four Sticks Press, I am able to do that. Like, I literally decided to put this book together two weeks ago. If I went with a traditional publisher, we’d still be dickering over the contract terms.

What’s the drawback to that?

I mean, I have to do everything myself, more or less. It’s a lot of work on the front end. Layout, cover design, proofreading, fact-checking. Stressing about things not coming out right. Publicity (which I suck at).

I have a ready-made distributor, because of Amazon—but the flip side of that is, I have to use Amazon. Booksellers can stock the book, via a company called Ingram Spark. But they probably won’t know about the book, so the chances of you seeing this at your local bookstore—to say nothing of in an airport bookstore, or at Target—are slim.

So how can we help?

You could buy a copy—or buy your own and send one to a friend. If you’re a free subscriber and want to support my work without commitment, it’s an ideal way.

You can help get the word out. Telling your local indie bookstore that it exists, and ordering a copy that way. Reviews on Amazon and elsewhere are always helpful.

Or just, you know, share this.

Thanks, as always, for your support!