Con Artists Roundup

Check out these exciting upcoming nonfiction titles featuring swindlers, liars, and con artists!

YOU’LL NEVER BELIEVE ME: A Life of Lies, Second Tries, and Things I Should Only Tell My Therapist by Kari Ferrell
9781250288226 | 1/7/25

The compelling, edgy, compassionate, laugh-out-loud memoir from Kari Ferrell, formerly known as the Hipster Grifter

Before Anna Delvey, before the Tinder Swindler, there was Kari Ferrell. Adopted at a young age by a Mormon family in Utah, Kari struggled with questions of self-worth and identity as one of the few Asian Americans in her insulated community, leading her to run with the “bad crowd” in an effort to fit in. Soon, she graduated from petty crimes to more serious grifts, stealing money from unsuspecting targets and eventually hitting Utah’s Most Wanted List. Desperate for a fresh start, she moves to New York City, slips into the indie-sleaze scene where she games her way to a job at Vice Magazine, picks up men and their wallets at clandestine bars, and becomes known as the “Hipster Grifter,” a moniker that she would never escape.

As the media–in true early aughts form–sensationalizes and fetishizes her story and thousands follow along online, Kari hides from cops in a grungy Brooklyn apartment, eventually goes to jail where she survives riots and makes friends with her fellow inmates, and continues her search for her roots.

In turns rollicking and irreverent, warm and compassionate, Kari’s is a heartfelt memoir of redemption and reconciliation, as she eventually dedicates her life to activism, social justice, reform, and setting the record straight. YOU’LL NEVER BELIEVE ME tells Kari’s story for the first time, introducing a fresh, hilarious new voice to the literary stage, and offering readers a nostalgic, uplifting, and, at times, unbelievable book that grapples with truth, why we lie, and what it means when our pasts don’t paint the whole picture.

SISTER SINNER: The Miraculous, Scandalous Story of Aimee Semple McPherson by Claire Hoffman
9780374601713 | 3/18/25

A spring day in 1926: Aimee Semple McPherson goes for a swim in the Pacific Ocean and vanishes. She is presumed dead. Weeks later she reappears in the desert, claiming to have been kidnapped. A national media frenzy and months of investigation ensue. Who was this woman?

America’s most famous evangelist, McPherson used spectacle, storytelling, and the newest technology—including her own radio station—to bring God’s message to the masses. Her innovations brought Pentecostalism into the mainstream, paved the way for televangelists, and shaped the future of American Christianity. Her Angelus Temple in Echo Park, Los Angeles, can be called the first megachurch. Her Foursquare Church continues, with more than eight million faithful around the world.

But after her disappearance, as crowds gathered at the water’s edge, people asked: Was McPherson everybody’s saintly sister, or a con-artist sinner? This is the story of what happened next—sex scandals, religious persecution, legal shenanigans, the unshakable faith of thousands of followers, and the race to report it all. A riveting journey into the rise of popular religion in America and life in early Hollywood, told with the flavor of the period’s noir mysteries, Claire Hoffman’s SISTER SINNER is the thrilling story of an iconic woman, largely overlooked, who changed the world.

THE MOTHER NEXT DOOR: Medicine, Deception, and Munchausen by Proxy by Andrea Dunlop and Mike Weber
9781250284273 | 2/4/25

No bond is more sacred than that between a mother and child. And no one is more sympathetic than a mother whose child faces a life-threatening illness. But what if the mother is the cause of the illness? What if the sympathy is the point?

Munchausen by proxy (MBP) has fascinated and horrified both professionals and the general public since this disturbing form of child abuse was first identified. But even as the public has been captivated by these tales of abuse and deception, there remains widespread misinformation and confusion about MBP. Are these mothers unfeeling psychopaths, or sick women who need help? And more important, how can we protect the children whose lives are at stake?

THE MOTHER NEXT DOOR offers a groundbreaking look at MBP from an unlikely duo: a Seattle novelist whose own family was torn apart by it, and the Texas detective who has worked on more medical child abuse cases than anyone in the nation. Readers ride along on three high-stakes MPB investigations; through riveting reporting and shocking stories from the family members, friends, and doctors caught in the blast zone of these unthinkable acts, a twisted portrait of motherhood and deceit is revealed.

With help from some of the top MBP experts in the world, Dunlop and Weber uncover the complex maze of psychological, systemic, and cultural issues that compound MBP and offer solutions for how we might find our way out.