Con and Consequence by Ian Rodney Lazarus; A Simple Cybercrime Leads To Bigger Terrorism

 

Con and Consequence  by Ian Rodney Lazarus; A Simple Cybercrime Leads To Bigger Terrorism 

By Julie Sara Porter 

Bookworm Reviews 

Spoilers: Who would have thought that a simple cybercrime/con job would lead to a terrorist attack that will create generations of hardship and war between Palestine and Israel?

That is the premise that faces various characters in several countries and two continents in Ian Rodney Lazarus’s Con and Consequence, a suspenseful, tightly plotted, but wide spread Thriller.

The eponymous con artist is Jelani, a Somali genius who is using his vast intellect to create fake crowdfunding sites to draw in potential investors while operating as a ghost on the Web. Not exactly legit but cunning, non violent, and gives him and his family some much needed money. However, this scheme reaches Muhammad Amir Abbas who recruits Jelani to join his organization which has a plan for much deadlier consequences and to stick it to various enemies notably the United States and Israel. 

Meanwhile, Richard O'Brien, a linguist for the FBI intercepts a message that hints at a major terrorist attack in three days time. This investigation soon involves various terrorist organizations, the FBI, CIA, Mossad, the US, Palestinian, and Israeli governments, the Muslim population of Dearborn, Michigan, and O’Brien’s college age brother and girlfriend.

Lazarus does an excellent job of taking all of these various characters, settings, and plot points and tying them neatly together to make a comprehensible and perspicuous plot. The action starts small but leads to widespread complications that can lead to long term consequences for years and even decades afterwards.

This book focuses on various characters but the most interesting are three: O’Brien, Jelani, and an enigmatic character named The Professor who will be mentioned later. They form a triangle that takes the Reader through the various angles in the narrative and personalizes them. 

O’Brien is an anti-hero made for this type of story. Though he works with the FBI, he is himself not an agent so his pursuits are a more scholarly and communicative nature. This particular case puts him up front and center doing the leg work that his colleagues do. 

O’Brien has a very close Irish Catholic family with whom he loves but comes to disagree with, particularly about his job which causes his parents to worry. He is also tight with his brother, Myles who is a well meaning but immature goofball who accidentally stumbles upon the case himself. What starts out to be a funny and contrived coincidence becomes darker as Myles gets closer to his brother's career than he more than likely intended. 

O’Brien’s romantic history is held under scrutiny. He ignores the calls of a former girlfriend until realizing too heartbreakingly late why she called. This subplot and another in which he has a flirtation with a female agent show him as the type of man who is inept in his personal life but adept at his work. His personal life is one of failed relationships and few close connections outside of his immediate family so he devotes his time to his job. He embraces the adrenaline thrills and larger picture of preserving democracy because that's all that he has.

 It's a chaotic existence but it's one that O’Brien can use his linguistic skills and intellect to play an important part to the world at large. It's hard to focus on a personal life with romance, relationships, and daily tasks when one is constantly aware that  terrorist organizations are plotting to commit major fatalities half a world away.

Jelani represents those who join such organizations and live lives of crime. For Jelani, it's a matter of having a lot of brain, feeling like an outsider and not having much money or opportunity. We learn that Jelani has a high IQ and was recently diagnosed with being on the Autism spectrum. Since his diagnosis was as an adult and he doesn't have access to many resources that help him, he has many of the disorder’s symptoms such as memorization, intense fixations on his favorite subjects, discomfort in public places, and sensitivity to sensory triggers. 

Jelani has difficulties functioning, is arrogant about his abilities, lives in abject poverty, and is susceptible to suggestion. Of course he's the perfect target for those who are looking for angry, arrogant, young people with axes to grind, simmering hatred for their situation, and are ready to commit desperate acts for it. 

However, Jelani seriously underestimates the situation that he is in. His fatal flaw is arrogance. He thinks that because he has this online scheme and a genius level IQ, he is ahead of everyone else but he fails to realize that when his superiors are fighting a war in which fatalities, terror, carnage, assault, and violence are to be expected, no one cares about his money making scheme. In fact, compared to their activities, his con job is the equivalent of a Yorkie puppy nipping at the heels of a wolf pack trying to prove that he can be the alpha head. 

To Jelani’s credit, once he becomes aware of the full implication of his new organization’s  crimes, he does what he can to separate himself from them. Hey, he may rob people of their money but he still has a conscience. He might be a genius in academics but an idiot in common sense but he has some standards. One of them is not countless violence towards random citizens to make a point that will only get worse because of the escalation of said violence. 

By far the most interesting enigmatic character is someone called The Professor. Not too much can be revealed in the review because of spoilers. Let's just say they are a cypher, someone who excels in hiding in the shadows.

They have a variety of pseudonyms and identities that are used periodically throughout the book, so characters and Readers are uncertain where The Professor’s real standards and allegiances lie. In one chapter, The Professor guides Jelani. In another, they work as a Mossad spy. You go through the book thinking one thing about them, then turn around and think something else. Then the final pages reveal a final twist that could either clarify or further muddy The Professor's personal truth. 

In fact the final reveal causes the Reader to look at the character and their actions differently. It also causes one to question the extremity of their motives and the means to achieve them. It makes one wonder if they were really sincere in committing their actions for their country or people or just for themselves. When a person manipulates that many people on various sides, and intentionally causes more destruction, do their real motives matter? 

Con and Consequence may start as a simple con job but ultimately that job like any other action eventually has consequences.

The Shabti by Megaera C. Lorenz; Phony Mediums, Egyptian Curses, and a Charming Gay Romance Makes a Chilling Historical Supernatural Horror

 The Shabti by Megaera C. Lorenz; Phony Mediums, Egyptian Curses, and  a Charming Gay Romance Makes a Chilling Historical Supernatural Horror

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Megaera C. Lorenz’s The Shabti has a lot going for it: An engaging historical setting, an inside look at the Spiritualists movement and the tricks that frauds pulled, a genuinely creepy supernatural threat, and a charming romantic gay couple that encounters these problems.

In the 1930’s, Dashiel Quicke was once a noted Spiritualist that many would pay top dollar to get his psychic impressions or communicate with deceased loved ones. He now spends his time exposing the hucksters and grifters of the Spiritualist Movement, revealing how they actually accomplished their tricks. During one of his lectures, he captures the interest of Professor Herman Goschalk, an Egyptologist and museum curator. Herman tells Dashiel that his museum is the center of some strange activity: footsteps, whispers, missing items, stuff being thrown around, bleeding walls, the usual. At first the situation seems easily explained by science or an overactive imagination but as Dashiel gets to know Herman and experiences more of these strange events, it becomes clear that they are being haunted by a real ghostly apparition, a ghost from Ancient Egypt who inflicts great pain, curses, and suffering against all it comes near. All of the flimflam tricks aren't going to save them when they are faced with the real thing.

From beginning to end, this is a book brilliantly charged with a sense of Historical Horror. Instead of going for big shocks and scares, The Shabti leisurely builds its pace by taking a straight line from events that are odd but could be explained to the cosmic horror in which the barriers between time and space and life and death must fade before that horror can be encountered and possibly defeated.

One of the ways that it accomplishes this fear is by giving us a protagonist who has seen the supernatural world from the inside and knows how people bend and use it to their advantage.

The most interesting moments early on in the book occur when Dashiel tells how Spiritualists operate. He describes how they hire spies in the queue to gather information then sneak into the mark’s house to take a valuable object to look like the “spirits” used “relocation” to appear in the medium’s hands. Information gathered by the spies, cold readings, and early special effects added to the performance to sway the audience. It's a pretty clever grift and a sweet scam that is easy to see why many are fooled, especially those who have lost loved ones or want proof of life after death.

 That life also comes to weigh in on Dashiel as he admits to Herman that many former clients, particularly a sickly elderly woman, came to bad ends because of their trust in Dashiel and his former colleagues. His past also figuratively comes back to haunt him when a former partner and lover wants to reignite their relationship both on and off stage. It doesn't take much for the former Spiritualist to see the guilt and danger that a life of deceiving others would bring, and it is understandable why he would expose it. However, his skeptical nature and career of exposing the Spiritualist Movement is just as much a vulnerability as when he was an active participant in scamming others, when he faces real ghosts. He has to use the same procedures seriously to save Herman and himself that he once used deceptively to gain money.

The fraudulent style of Spiritualism puts Dashiel in a false sense of confidence when he is faced with the Egyptian Ghost. He could assume that bleeding walls are rust, creaking walls are a house settling, footsteps and whispers are signs of an overactive imagination. But after a while, those scientific rationales and previous charlatan history becomes moot when those small signs become large unrecognizable monsters and the whispers become shouts of the undead.

It's enough to make one doubt their beliefs and particularly their minds. There are many chapters where the supernatural encounters cause tremendous physical and psychological pain to Dashiel and Herman. They are shaken, disturbed, and quite often bedridden after facing the remnants of the Egyptian Ghost’s curse. It is a terrifying experience because of how it affects their bodies and minds and the only healing balm they have is each other.

Speaking of Dashiel and Herman, their relationship is a bright spot in this Horror Show of Ancient Terror. It is one of those relationships that begin organically with the two beginning to understand and relate to one another. Herman is confused and fascinated by Dashiel’s career as a Spiritualist and is on the fence between skepticism and belief. Dashiel gets arcane knowledge from Herman’s studies and while he explains Spiritualism and gives possibilities to Herman's encounters, he never ridicules him and likes talking with him.

 A friendship grows between the two protagonists that in other works could have remained platonic but fortunately for them, it does not. Their romance begins  unexpectedly just as  the Reader might think, “Hmm, they would make a nice couple” a few pages before they actually kiss. Their love strengthens each other as Herman’s knowledge of Egyptology and Dashiel’s Spiritualism experience counter the Ghost's wrath.

This book is set in the 1930’s and it doesn't go into the legal and prejudicial ramifications and potential hardship that could occur if a romance between two men is made public. On the one hand, it does a mighty historical disservice in showing how courageous the two characters are just by being together. But on the other hand, it also proves to be a source of light and brightness in this dark disturbing supernatural world. 

When the two men work together to fight the Egyptian Ghost alongside friends and Dashiel’s former colleagues, their love is the truest and most honest thing that counters the terror of the otherworldly darkness but also the deception and mind games that Dashiel was once proud to be a part of.

New Book Alert: The Greatest Hoax on Earth: Catching Truth, While We Can by Alan C. Logan; True Crime Expose Pokes Holes Into The Story of Frank W. Abagnale Jr.,"The Great Imposter"

 

New Book Alert: The Greatest Hoax on Earth: Catching Truth, While We Can by Alan C. Logan; True Crime Expose Pokes Holes Into The Story of Frank W. Abagnale Jr.,"The Great Imposter" 

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: By now many are familiar with the story of Frank William Abagnale Jr. If they haven't read his autobiography, Catch Me If You Can, they may have seen the 2002 movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Abagnale and Tom Hanks or saw the Broadway musical starring Norbert Leo Butz, who won a Tony for his role as Abagnale.

For those that don't know his story, here it is: At 16 years old, Abagnale ran away to escape his divorced parents. On the run, he impersonated a Pan Am pilot, a chief resident at Cobb County General Hospital in Malcotta, Georgia, an attorney for the state attorney general of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, a professor at Brigham Young University and cashed over five million dollars in bad checks. He was finally caught before he was 21. He spent one year in a French prison,  one year in a Swedish prison, and four years in a US Federal penitentiary. Paroled, he later worked for the FBI on fraud scams and crime prevention. He became a billionaire because of his securities consultation business in which he continues to give tips on how people can avoid fraud scams. His story sounds almost too good to be true and hard to believe that it really happened. Well, Alan C. Logan, author of Your Brain on Nature, The Secret Life of Microbiome, and Self-Styled: Chasing Dr. Robert Vernon Spears, says that there is a reason for that because it never did happen. In fact for over forty years, Abagnale has been selling a story that was an entire hoax.

Logan's book The Greatest Hoax on Earth: Catching Truth, While We Can, writes a complete expose that pokes holes into Abagnale's image as a suave con man turned securities expert. It is a very thorough and detailed look that peers into the facts behind a story and cautions the Readers to find the truth before we believe in the appearance.

I myself bought Abagnale's story. I love the movie and still consider it one of my favorite DiCaprio films (second only to Shutter Island) but now I see it as purely a caper film, escapist, fun, and drenched in '60's nostalgia, but no more real than The Usual Suspects, Ocean's Eleven, or To Catch A Thief. A good film but simply fiction.

I have a deeper connection to this story. I met Abagnale once in college. He gave a lecture at the University of Missouri St. Louis and I was a reporter for the student newspaper. I attended his lecture and even got a few minutes alone with him to answer a few questions. Oh, there was nothing salacious or untoward in his behavior. He was very charming and friendly. However, looking back on that incident, there was one thing that should have raised more questions than it did at the time. 

I asked him how anyone could have believed him at the time and why none of his employers did a background check. His answer was along the line that "People were more trusting at the time." I remember thinking "That may be true but people then as they are now terrified of lawsuits and I would think that the possibility that their new attorney or surgeon would not have all of his credentials would have entered their minds." As a journalist, I should have trusted my instincts and been more curious and questioning, but I wasn't. I just wrote his lecture as it was, one of the many who played into Abagnale's fantasies and shared it like it was the truth.

Logan's book uses first person accounts from people who knew Abagnale such as his ex-girlfriend, retired flight attendant, Paula Parks and former agent, Mark Zinder. Logan also uses news articles, arrest records, and news articles to make his case against Abagnale and reveal the truth that lies behind the glamorous facade.

In fact, the story that Logan reveals is more of a ploy from a man desperate for attention rather than a skilled con man. Through Logan's words, Abagnale fabricated, exaggerated, and outright lied about his background.

Abagnale's real life crime story began with his arrest for pretty crimes in New York City, even stealing his father's credit card and writing bad checks. After a brief stint in the Navy, he was arrested multiple times in New York City only to be placed back in his parents' custody. Both his parents, Frank Sr. and Paula believed that their son was mentally ill and needed psychiatric help. His mother even stated that he wrote bad checks shortly after he was released in her custody.

Many of the more fantastic aspects of Abagnale's story contain what Logan calls "nuggets of truth" but greatly exaggerated by Abagnale himself. For example he did wear a pilot's uniform, impersonated a pilot, and wrote bad checks. But he mostly walked around the airports and never entered the jump seat. Also, his haul was less than 14,00 total not the millions that he claimed. 

One of the more memorable scenes in the movie was when Abagnale interviews a bevy of beautiful woman to selects them as flight attendants for a trip to Europe, but in reality needed them as a distraction to get past FBI agents. According to Abagnale, that really happened and the ladies had a good time in Europe. According to Logan, Abagnale attempted the ruse and less than twelve women arrived but left finding his questions creepy and insulting. Not only that, but Abagnale attempted this stunt in 1970 basing it on a real program that Pan Am discontinued the year before.

Abagnale exaggerated his infamy as well claiming that his crimes as the so-called "Skyway Man" (a term not even coined until the 70's long after Abagnale's criminal career would have ended) were the subject of huge headlines and many articles in the New York Times. Also, that he was on the FBI's Most Wanted List (a a list that is only reserved for violent criminals). Logan's search of the New York Times from that era revealed only one article about Abagnale and that was an account of one of his minor thefts.

Much of Abagnale's more elaborate claims of being a doctor, attorney, and professor were completely impossible because according to police records from 1966-1969, Abagnale was in prison for transportation of a stolen vehicle and larceny by forgery. Not to mention that none of the employees of Cobb County General Hospital, BYU, or the state attorney general's office in Baton Rouge at the time had heard of him. For example, the Cobb County hospital employees said that it was a small hospital and they surely would have remembered Abagnale or the aliases that he used.

Even his subsequent post-criminal career is cause for suspicion. According to Logan's book, the FBI agents that Abagnale claimed that he worked with, one he even said was his boss, admitted that they never knew him. The businesses that Abagnale said that he gave his security advice to said that they paid him and he only told them what most people know.

One of the more provocative claims was that Abagnale insisted that he only stole from banks and large businesses. He said that he never stole from small businesses or individuals and that he paid everyone that he stole from back. In Logan's book, Abagnale's crimes were hardly victimless and he took advantage and stole from many small businesses and people. At the time of Logan's writing, one man in Sweden still insists that Abagnale owes him money for a car that he stole. Abagnale is also reported to have stolen funds and assaulted female counselors at a children's camp in 1972 where he worked as a bus driver.

Among Abagnale's victims were Parks and Zinder. Parks's story in particular is chilling as she described Abagnale stalking her and practically moving in with her parents after only a brief time of them being together. After Abagnale robbed the Parks family, Parks said that she and her parents developed lifelong trust issues and she had PTSD from their encounter.

One of the more interesting courageous moments in the book is in the final chapters when Parks confronted Abagnale one final time after his story hit stage and screen. She tried to remind him who she was and what he did to her. Even though he was rattled, Abagnale continued to deny knowing her and insisted that his story was true. Parks saw Abagnale as "a small man who told his story so often that he believed it."

Zinder's story is also interesting as he got to know Abagnale after his alleged criminal career had ended and he achieved fame for his story, appearing on To Tell The Truth and The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson. Zinder helped Abagnale spread and sell his story while keeping some of the more sordid details out of the public eye, liike the mysterious appearance of a wife after Abagnale played the part of a womanizer in his public appearances in the '70's. (Later the wife, Kelly, became more instrumental from the '80's onward when Abagnale portrayed himself as a family man.).

Zinder also recounted the darker side of his former friend's attitude such as bilking him out of money and Zinder's then wife, Fran, having an uncomfortable private encounter with Abagnale in which she never revealed the full details but had clearly traumatized her. (Long after they parted ways, Zinder reunited with Abagnale who apologized for "that thing with Fran" but never elaborated what it specifically was. As of the publication of the book, he still did not know).

While Logan does a thorough job of exposing Abagnale there is one glaring puzzling aspect to this book. Parks and Zinder are not the only ones who have confronted Abagnale over his claims. An article in the San Francisco Chronicle could not find any truth to his claims and a professor challenged his students to investigate the story. However, at no point has Abagnale ever been sued or formerly charged with deceiving the public for his claims. 

The penalty for claiming to be a Federal government employee alone is a federal crime that is punishable with a fine and up to three years in prison. Riane Brownlee was sentenced for three years just for claiming to be an FBI agent on her dating profile last year. Abagnale has been telling this story since 1976-77 and how come not once has the FBI charged him or given him a formal reprimand to say that he never worked with them?

Now Abagnale always insisted that the people that he worked for never mentioned his name to avoid embarrassment. That's his excuse what's Logan's or rather the people who spoke to him? How come in the last 40 plus years that Abagnale spent allegedly lying to the public there isn't a more formal investigation into his claims or he hasn't been charged with fraud, or at least sued by any of his former colleagues or representatives from his former workplaces by faking his connection with them? (Surely, the publicity of ferreting out an imposter who never worked at a place is much better than the humiliation that a 16 year old with no actual experience and training manipulated his way into those fields.) What about the people who paid for his speaking engagement and consultation, why isn't there more of an outcry about his lack of security expertise?

Was Abagnale telling the truth more than Logan wanted to admit? In his dislike for Abagnale and his haste to bury Abagnale not to praise him, did Logan not follow his own research and instincts? Did Logan do the very thing that he accused the public of doing when buying Abagnale's story in the first place? Is Abagnale's story half true and half false and if so which parts? Is Logan believing his own he telling the truth or is he like Abagnale believing his own story?

Well if Logan and his informants are telling the truth and Abagnale really has been deceiving the public all this time, then in an ironic way Frank W. Abagnale Jr. really is the greatest con artist of them all.