The best reading on that period I'm aware of is the Jim Carleton book "Apple". He's a WSJ reporter who was covering the company at the time and the book covers the period ending around when Jobs returned but before he stepped in as CEO. The thing I find most interesting about that book is it was written without being tainted by knowledge of the company's later resurgence. It provides a really different take than anything written much later. I didn't care for Walter Isaacson's book much, he injects too much of his own opinion into things and besides being obnoxious I don't think his calibration on the business is very good.