NEWSMAKER: 'Only America could produce an Aubrey McClendon' -- author

Gregory Zuckerman, a writer at The Wall Street Journal, spent months researching Aubrey McClendon's early life and his rise as the co-founder of Chesapeake Energy Corp. That research became part of Zuckerman's best-selling 2013 book "The Frackers: The Outrageous Inside Story of the New Billionaire Wildcatters," which detailed the fortunes that were being made in the shale drilling boom. In an interview with EnergyWire, Zuckerman said McClendon's story could have happened only in the American Southwest, and his fortune could only have been made during the first decade of the shale boom. "He was a character, and as a writer, you need characters," Zuckerman said.