Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb
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Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb
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It was a time of unregulated madness. And nowhere was it madder than in Chicago at the dawn of the Roaring Twenties. Speakeasies thrived, gang war shootings announced Al Capone's rise to underworld domination, Chicago's corrupt political leaders fraternized with gangsters, and the frenzy of stock market gambling was rampant. Enter a slick, smooth-talking, charismatic lawyer named Leo Koretz, who enticed hundreds of people (who should have known better) to invest as much as $30 million - upward of $400 million today - in phantom timberland and nonexistent oil wells in Panama.
When Leo's scheme finally collapsed in 1923, he vanished, and the Chicago state's attorney, a man whose lust for power equaled Leo's own lust for money, began an international manhunt that lasted almost a year. When finally apprehended, Leo was living a life of luxury in Nova Scotia under the assumed identity of a book dealer and literary critic. His mysterious death in a Chicago prison topped anything in his almost-too-bizarre-to-believe life.
Empire of Deception is not only an incredibly rich and detailed account of a man and an era; it's a fascinating look at the methods of swindlers throughout history. Leo Koretz was the Bernie Madoff of his day, and Dean Jobb shows us that the dream of easy wealth is a timeless commodity.
Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb - Amazon Sales Rank: #15661 in Audible
- Published on: 2015-05-19
- Released on: 2015-05-19
- Format: Unabridged
- Original language: English
- Running time: 569 minutes
Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb
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Most helpful customer reviews
59 of 63 people found the following review helpful. A Great Tale, Fun To Read By Andy in Washington True crime is one of my guilty pleasures, especially con artists. I had heard of Leo Koretz, but had never quite appreciated his abilities as a con man and swindler. Scaled for inflation, he is certainly in the same league as Bernie Madoff as a master of his “craft”.=== The Good Stuff ===* Jobb writes well, and treats us to a well-written and lively narrative. For the most part, the book moves along at a reasonable pace, and Jobb was able to capture and maintain my interest with a 100 year old story.* The book seems well grounded in the facts, although it is not footnoted or well referenced. It is written as a popular work, not an academic one. That was mostly OK with me, except for a few issues discussed below.* The story is, despite the sadness of many people being swindled, somewhat of a “fun” tale. Koretz is certainly an interesting character, a master salesman, con artist and Jay Gatsby wanna-be. He manages to con some very rich and powerful people, the kind who you would expect to know better, and does so with a very simple scheme and not a lot of effort. Any one of his victims no doubt had the ability to unravel his scheme with a single conversation with the right person, but none ever seemed to bother.* Robb does a nice job of capturing the whole story. We see how the scheme got started, watch it grow, see it unravel, and finally witness the crash as it affected both the con man and his victims. Robb weaves the story into life in the US, and especially Chicago, during the Roaring 20’s, and ties many of the events together.=== The Not-So-Good Stuff ===* My biggest complaint is the inclusion of “background” information. While Robb is telling the tale of Koretz the swindler, he takes the reader down numerous side detours about Chicago politics, crime and corruption during the prohibition era. You could make the case that these are either excellent background and add a dimension and context to the story…or you could call them filler designed to make a book out of an article. Personally I found them more distracting than enlightening, but your opinions may vary.* There are quite a number of named characters, and it wasn’t always easy to keep them straight. There is a “program” at the beginning of the book to help sort through the characters, but to be honest, I never find that feature to be helpful when I am reading, especially electronic copies.* As always, I am suspicious of detailed accounts of conversations that happened nearly 100 years ago- but as re-creations they stand the test of reasonableness and make the story flow better.=== Summary ===I like the book, and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in true crime or the abilities of con men to separate people from their money. My own preference would been to have more details on the mechanics of the scam, rather than the personal and relationship side of it, but I suspect the technical details may have been lost to history. The actions of the dapper Mr. Koretz were certainly fun to read, and Robb creates a character that you can’t help but liking-even as he shows himself to be a cad.As I read the book, my most common thought was that it would be impossible to pull off today. A little internet searching would have blown the tales of Panamanian oil wells and Arkansas rice paddies to smithereens… and then I remembered that Bernie Madoff and AIG ran pretty much the same cons well into the information age. The tactics were different, but the strategy was the same.=== Disclaimer ===I was able to read the book through the courtesy of the publisher and Netgalley.
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful. The Ponzi Scheme, basically an overnight chump change scam compared to Leo Koretz. By milo Excellent read. Forget about the "Ponzi Scheme", it should be known as the "Leo Koretz Scheme". This con man makes Ponzi a piker. Dean Jobb did a great job researching this book and taking us through this decades long scan, probably Madoff got his ideas from Mr. Koretz. Will now have to look at other works by this author.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful. A fantastic true story. By Donna C I found EMPIRE OF DECEPTION so incredibly fascinating I really couldn’t put it down (I did have to because of work, stupid work). Jobb wrote it in such a captivating way that it sucked me right in and held me with this almost ridiculous story of a non-Ponzi Ponzi who made Ponzi look like a Girl Scout.Creating his scheme years before Ponzi ever did, and continuing years after he was caught, Leo Koretz effectively wrote the book on corruption and deception. Not only did he scheme people through not one but at least three different investment dupes he ducked out of dodge and went into hiding for a year under an assumed identity and continued to live lavishly on the money he’d stolen. Never mind he was already living a double life before he was caught. With an infinite number of dirt bag levels to his character these are the things reality TV should be made of. All the ridiculousness of this man’s life didn’t need embellishment. It was insane enough as it was.Jobb did excellent work in researching the details of Koretz’s life (and the lives of those around him and directly and indirectly affected by him) and brought them to life on the page. I might as well have been reading a newspaper and the events could have been current, it was so lifelike. The thing about Koretz, and I think Jobb captured this perfectly, was that outwardly he wasn’t a sleaze. He was a relatable, genial man who endeared people to him with a great personality. And he used that. He used reverse psychology in order to get people to trust him more. People didn’t believe him to be a shady character and he never presented himself as such. I found myself almost buying into him as an upstanding person because he didn’t outwardly do bad things. He wasn’t a gangster, he didn’t appear to be a philanderer, he appeared to have a completely legitimate business. On top of that he was nothing who crawled his own way to something by the road of hard work and determination, and again, was legal about it. He just didn’t have much by the way of scruples.This book was so lively and focused not only on Koretz as a person but on the time he lived in. The 20s were alive in EMPIRE OF DECEPTION and in a decade where excess was everything Koretz was at the top of it. This wasn’t just a rehash of past events told for the sake of education. This was a story, a tale to tell, and Jobb told it with stunning accuracy and a flare for the fantastic that didn’t hamper the story but supplemented the fantastic elements perfectly.If you want to read about a piece of history that’s been largely forgotten, left in the shadow of another shyster who left a much smaller mark in the greater world of scandal, you’ll love EMPIRE OF DECEPTION. It’s a learning session and a drama all wrapped into one. From nailing the setting of the time perfectly to staying out of the story as the author and letting the facts speak for themselves to a voice that will just drag you in and won’t let go, you won’t want to put it down. I’m generally interested in this time period anyway but even I surprised myself with how much I liked this book. It was just phenomenal all around.5I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb
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Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb
Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb
