Con Artists Memoir

"An engrossing microcosm of the internet’s Wild West years" (Kirkus Reviews), award-winning journalist David Kushner tells the incredible battle between the founder of Match.com and the con man who swindled him out of the website Sex.com, resulting in an all-out war for control for what still powers the internet today: love and sex.

It's the foundation of any enduring relationship between friends, lovers, spouses, and families. But when trust is placed in those who are not what they seem, the results can be deadly. Ann Rule, who famously chronicled her own shocking experience of unknowingly befriending a sociopath in The Stranger Beside Me, offers a riveting, all-new collection from her true-crime files, with the lethally shattered bonds of trust at the core of each blood-soaked account.

In 1988 a troubled young man and his flamboyant mother were arrested for murdering a wealthy widow in her New York City mansion. Suddenly America was transfixed by a pair of real-life film noir characters. The media couldn't get enough of the twisted relationship between Sante Kimes and her 23-year-old son Kenny. But the most chilling story of all was never told - until now. Kent Walker, Sante's elder son, reveals how he survived 40 years of "the Dragon Lady's" very special brand of motherly love and still managed to get away.

In The Murder of Marilyn Monroe: Case Closed, renowned MM expert Jay Margolis and New York Times best-selling author Richard Buskin finally lay to rest more than 50 years of wild speculation and misguided assertions by actually naming the screen goddess's killer. At the same time, they use the testimony of eyewitnesses to describe exactly what took place inside her house on Fifth Helena Drive in Los Angeles's Brentwood neighborhood.

A lack of love in an authoritarian household sparked Andrew’s lifelong search for love and belonging. His AA sponsor introduced him to A Course in Miracles, which Andrew studied deeply for twenty years. Then a celebrated spiritual teacher invited him to edit his first book and join his community. Andrew had been led to believe that he was chosen to find the Love of God. After a heart-rending parting from his family, he moved to Utah and joined the community.

On a bitterly cold afternoon in December 1986, a Michigan State trooper found the frozen body of Jerry Tobias in the bed of his pickup truck. The 31-year-old oil field worker and small-time drug dealer was clad only in jeans, a checkered shirt, and cowboy boots. Inside the cab of the truck was a fresh package of expensive steaks from a local butcher shop, the first lead in a case that would be quickly lost in a thicket of bungled forensics, shady prosecution, and a psychopathic star witness out for revenge.

For more than 60 years, Southern Californians entrusted the bodies of their loved ones to the Sconce family's Lamb Funeral Home. But the heirs to the fourth-generation funeral empire betrayed that trust with a series of gruesome crimes against the dead. Featured on ABC-TV's Nightline.

In 1988, detectives from the Sacramento Police Department were called to investigate the disappearance of a man at his last known address - a boarding house for the elderly, homeless, and mentally ill. The owner, Dorothea Puente, was an adorable old lady who cared for stray cats and the rest of society’s castaways. She had a strong standing in the community and was celebrated for her selfless charitable work.

Alex Blum was a good kid, a popular high school hockey star from a tight-knit Colorado family. He had one goal in life: endure a brutally difficult selection program, become a US Army Ranger, and fight terrorists for his country. In the first hours of his final leave before deployment to Iraq, Alex was supposed to fly home to see his family and beloved girlfriend. Instead, he got into his car with two fellow soldiers and two strangers, drove to a local bank in Tacoma, and committed armed robbery....

While the mainstream media protects the innermost circles of the establishment, this audiobook reveals the harrowing truth of elite child molesters and the calculated methods they employ to conceal their horrific activities, which often span decades.

When Mary met Will Jordan online, she was a single mother who’d given up trying to find Mr Right. And yet here he suddenly was: articulate and attractive, with a fascinating background. Soon they were in love, and when he proposed after a month it seemed recklessly romantic. Caught up in a whirlwind, Mary accepted that Will’s work often took him away from home, out of contact. She was his rock, supporting him emotionally when a misunderstanding led to criminal charges, and even selling everything when blackmailers threatened to kidnap their children. Together, they took on the world.

Chris Bathum was a respected therapist, addiction specialist, and founder of one of the fastest-growing rehabilitation chains in America. But Bathum was a total fraud: he was a homicidal meth-head with a history of sexually abusing his patients, scamming insurance companies, and eliminating whistle-blowers. Like Rose Stahl. But this intended victim would be his last. Stahl would risk her life to bring down the monster she and so many other people in need had once trusted for their salvation.

What can drive a young and seemingly innocent child to kill? Murder is horrible enough when perpetrated by adults, and yet the concept takes on a whole new level of chilling morbidity when a murderer is revealed to be a young boy or girl. Is it the result of severe trauma manifesting itself in the most macabre of ways? Is it the progeny of some severe mental disorder? Or were they influenced by the actions of the people they grew up with? Most of the time, the answers to such a question are simple but no less horrific.

While some of these cases are sure to tickle the memory of any true crime enthusiast, some might just be new to you. One thing all these cold cases have in common is that they’ve finally been solved, some with incredibly shocking outcomes.

The Baldwins were a strong Christian family living in Plano, Texas. When their 17-year-old daughter, Mackenzie, met Aadam in a random-match online chat room, she fell for his good looks, his charm, and his respectful conversation. He told her he lived in New York, and they began an online friendship. But over the course of a few months, Aadam revealed that he actually lived in Kosovo and had only pretended to live in New York so Mackenzie would keep chatting with him.

Everything about Joe seemed perfect, and Alice was the happiest she'd ever been. Then one day Joe saw a message on her phone and discovered something that changed everything. Although it was from an old love, he ignored Alice's explanations and desperate pleas. And soon the violence and abuse began. As she attempted to prove to Joe that he really was her world, Alice gave up everything that mattered to her, including her family, her friends and her job. But still it wasn't enough.

By the long-time art critic of The Daily Telegraph, Warhol After Warhol tells the David-and-Goliath story of collector Joe Simon and his struggles with the [Andy] Warhol Authentication Board, a tale of power, corruption and lies, a Bad Blood for the art world.

On December 9, 2001, Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of a staircase in her Durham, NC home. Her scalp was laced with deep incisions, and her blood was strewn from outside to inside the house. The sinister truth of that night turned her murder into North Carolina's most enigmatic criminal case, capturing media attention across the globe.

In the world of high finance, multibillion-dollar Wall Street banks greedily guard their secrets. Enter Robert Kerbeck, a working actor who made his real money lying on the phone, charming people into revealing their employers’ most valuable information. In this exhilarating memoir that will appeal to fans of The Wolf of Wall Street and Catch Me If You Can, unsuspecting receptionists, assistants, and bigshot executives all fall victim to “the Ruse.”

Drowning in debt and facing almost certain bankruptcy, John Darwin did the unthinkable—he paddled out to sea in his red canoe and disappeared. After a massive search and rescue operation failed to find his body, he was assumed dead, lost in the bleak North Sea. But everything was far from what it seemed. Nearly six years later, after John miraculously returned from the dead with a strange tale of 'amnesia' and sporting a suspicious golden tan, the police and the press were desperate to discover the truth behind his remarkable resurrection.