Simpson insists that you see it. He has given us an anatomy of globalized labor at its most shameful, complete with the internal correspondence of American military and Kellogg Brown & Root officials reporting coerced labor and human trafficking to their superiors. “These kinds of allegations really need to be put to bed in such a manner that we do not revisit them each time a ‘social crusader’ comes on the scene,” one of the company’s procurement managers wrote in response to the complaints.

It is unfortunate, given this achievement, that Simpson felt it necessary to remove himself from the heart of the story. He builds the book’s plot around Kamala Magar, the 19-year-old wife of one of the murdered workers. Kamala is a courageous woman: Rendered a nonperson by her widowhood, she leaves her husband’s family to build an independent life for herself — a breathtaking risk for a teenager with a new baby — and eventually travels to the United States to testify in the case against Kellogg Brown & Root.

But Simpson attributes thoughts to Kamala too freely, stumbling into clichés. (“Deep anxiety and worry remained her constant companions, no matter how far from home she traveled,” he writes at one point.) It feels incorrect, as well, to plant Kamala as a central actor in the legal case pursued by a Washington law firm on behalf of the men’s families, though one can understand why Simpson chose to. Journalists, like class-action lawsuits, need a hero.

I just wish Simpson had acknowledged his own role as a prosecutor. As journalists we labor under the illusion that we are not players in the stories we write. We are taught that we are present to observe and document. But by scraping away at layers of corporate misdirection, by asking and asking again and not letting go, Simpson reached something naked and ugly and unimpeachably true.