Very informative and easy to follow. Some really good tips. It started off really great. Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book

Amazing book. Easy five stars! I did not want to put it down! Will be recommending in my Facebook group! Also buying copies for my book loving family members!

Review of Advance Reader’s Copy eBook

How do you identify a con artist/scammer in this day and age when there seems to be someone [or several someones] trying to pull a fast one on you?

Johnathan Walton has put together a list of fourteen of what he considers the most obvious “red flags” to help identify scammers before they can carry out their mission of separating you from your hard-earned savings.

For the reader, the author has put together stories related to each of his red flags . . . stories that illustrate the lengths to which scammers will go in order to deceive the hard-working victim-to-be. It’s intriguing and terrifying, informative and frightening to think that so many thieves can get away with so much. This is a book that belongs on everyone’s must-read list. After all, forewarned is forearmed.

Recommended.

I received a free copy of this eBook from Rodale Inc. / Rodale Books and NetGalley and am voluntarily leaving this review.
#AnatomyofaConArtist #NetGalley

This is one book everyone should read.

Johnathan Wilson, TV producer in LA, was good friends with a neighbor in his apartment building. He was shocked to learn the hard way that she was a professional con artist who cleverly asked him as well as many others for money – lots of it. His experience and knowledge outlines how to spot a scammer with “14 red flags.”

Years ago, people had trust in each other for the most part and then there was the internet which changed everything. Now technology is a huge concern. We know not to return e-mails from someone in Nigeria. However, he said it’s now possible for scammers to call from any country and make it appear as if it’s a family member with their actual phone number. He said AI can sound like anyone you may know.

This book has some hair-raising stories that may give you chills for what has happened to people simply wanting to help others. He said sometimes it’s a loved one or someone you’ve known for years who will ask for money.

Often times, people don’t say a word about it as it’s embarrassing. I know as it happened to someone in my extended family years ago when $100,000 went into the hands of a con artist. She checked off many of the red-flag categories.

The book is informative with first-hand experience from being scanned to sending the criminal to jail. It’s a quick book to read. It may save you or others from being a target.

My thanks to Rodale Books and NetGalley for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book with an expected release date of August 19, 2025.

Thanks Rodale Books and Netgalley for this eARC, these opinions are my own. A really insightful read. Walton discusses experiences with scammers. He discusses 14 red flags to help people spot scammers. He discusses what to watch for and how to protect yourself. A thoughtful and informational book that provides real world experiences with scammers. Intriguing and provides plenty of help for people to protect themselves.

I thought this book started off strong, but the second half completely fell flat. The first part had solid insights, breaking down manipulation tactics and common red flags in an engaging way. I was interested in how con artists operate and felt like I was actually learning something useful.

Then the second half happened. Instead of building momentum, it dragged, becoming repetitive and unfocused. It felt like the book was just stretching itself out rather than delivering anything new or worthwhile. I lost interest, and by the end, it was more frustrating than informative.

While there are some decent takeaways in the beginning, the book overall didn’t deliver the strong finish it should have. I wouldn’t go out of my way to recommend it.

2.5 rounded

I was genuinely excited to read this book—the premise sounded fascinating, and the endorsement from a real FBI special agent had me hooked. Unfortunately, what followed felt more like a self-congratulatory memoir than an insightful look into cons and scammers. The author repeatedly reminds the reader of how intelligent he is, seemingly baffled that even he could be scammed. One line reads, “It also demonstrated what little regard she had for me and my intelligence”—and that tone persists throughout.

While some of the other stories featured in the book were interesting enough to warrant my rounding up to two stars, the overall structure felt scattered and disorganized. The author frequently references his popular podcast with more than a hint of arrogance, and many of his conclusions come off as naïve at best, egotistical at worst. At times, it felt like the book was less about shedding light on cons and more about spotlighting the author’s bruised ego. What could have been a compelling exposé turned into a frustrating read that I was eager to finish—just to be done with it.

This feels like it should have been an article. Anatomy of a Con Artist by Johnathan Walton has a few things going for it. True crime is always an easy sell, and Walton is a victim of a con himself. Plus, lists are always fun to peruse on your own time and pick apart.

The actual execution of all of this is pretty flawed, however. Walton immediately raised on eyebrow for me when he says that we can't really trust the "research" (and yes, he used quotes) from scientific studies. Instead, someone like him, who was actually conned, is in a better place to put out this information. Ironically, it makes him sound like a con man.

The organization is also suspect. While breaking down the con artist into 14 red flags sounds good, each of those flags is strangely marked and then mixed up with the long story of Walton's own con. Some red flags are well tagged, like "Too Kind, Too Quick" but another is just tagged as "Technology." Each red flag has an explanation and a story that goes along with it. I found myself wanting to know more about each of these stories, but instead the book then goes into another sub-chapter of Walton's con experience. It all felt like Walton wanted to tell his own story by itself, but it wasn't book length so he added the extra stuff without forming a cohesive narrative. Allusions to past and future podcast projects gave me the feeling that is a sideshow to what is supposed to be the main event.

Walton's writing style also grated on me. He seems to ramp the drama up unnecessarily and says things like, "Do you see where this is going?" As I mentioned, if this was an article and not a book, this wouldn't bother me as much. But a book is much longer, and it begins to feel like you are having your intelligence insulted.

If you don't mind the hodgepodge of information, then you can find some interesting stories in here. I think, though, that like me you will just want to read something that tells those stories specifically.

(This book was provided as an advance copy by Netgalley and Rodale Books.)

Psychological crimes/issues are always intriguing to me. We have seen many scams lately at a macro level in the media (Apple Cider Vinegar, Anna Delvey, Theranos, etc) but what about your everyday people who fall into a trap? In this book, Walton discusses his and others experiences with scammers. What he’s realized is that at their core, these people all pull the same behavior.

I thought this book was very insightful. It described many situations where people were scammed, and even though sometimes I feel like I’d catch a scammer, they really play into your feelings to break you. I think everyone should read this book.

Also, not a bad idea to run a quick background check on people who enter your life. Might seem a lil weird at first but I’ve watched too many true crime stories and listened to too many podcasts.

"Con artists like Mair don't just take your money, they take a piece of your soul you can never get back" The author has been personally impacted by con artists and out of that experience, they are able and willing to provide guidance to other victims. This book is not only informational but also entertaining. I, thankfully, have not lost hundreds of thousands of dollars to a scammer but this book still offered me intriguing insights. As internet influencers are part of the world economy now, some of these con artist commandments can be applied to them. The author mentions a podcast they will be launching and I look forward to that!

Have an editor look this over another time. There are some missing words or missed capitalizations/ general grammar mistakes.

I have an educational background in psychology and international criminal law and justice (e.g., white collar crime, trafficking, etc), so I was hoping this would be an entertaining, informative take on a serious topic. Based on his 14 red flags of a professional scammer, the book features chapters of others’ unfortunate experiences with con artists (which reminded me of mini synopses of American Greed episodes), including the author’s personal retelling of events involving Queen of the Con, Mair Symth.. Unfortunately I was familiar with some of the cases mentioned so I skimmed through some pages. If I was not familiar with the subject already this definitely would have been a better reading experience.

I would highly recommend Anatomy of a Con Artist to anyone! Johnathan Walton does a great job breaking down the red flags waved by con artists, with specific examples to help illustrate them. The book is informative, but also approachable and, dare I say, funny. I also appreciated that Walton included an appendix describing what to do if you find that you've been scammed. A must read!

This book is a must-read to avoid becoming the victim of any type of scam: financial, romantic, or psychological. Walton provides Red Flags that can be found in most cons. His main takeaway— con artists don’t outsmart you, they out-feel you—is worth its weight in gold!

The first thing worth doing when reading a book like this is to check the credentials of the author.

Jonathan Walton hosts a podcast called The Queen of the Con: The Irish Heiress”, he’s also a con artist vigilante, who has taken down con artists and he’s also a regional Emmy award winner in the US (source Wikipedia).

This book neatly summarises the things to look out for if someone is trying to con you. These, Walton calls RED FLAGS:

For example:

RED FLAG #1: “I just want to help”.
RED FLAG #4: “Isolation”
RED FLAG #5: “I’m better than you”.

I’ve only listed three of the RED FLAGS – there are fourteen. Each RED FLAG has its own chapter, nicely explained by the author and with several real-life stories to illustrate each one. It’s amazing the gall of some of these con-artists, I don’t know how they do it. They leave a trail of destruction, broken people, and families. It’s horrible.

This is an fascinating read and if you’re interested in this topic you will find this worthwhile.

This book is amazing. The author, Johnathan Walton, co-created and hosted the Queen of the Con podcast, where he described how he was conned by a woman he believed was his friend. In Anatomy of a Con Artist, he recaps the Queen of the Con story along with several other stories about people conned out of their life savings by grifters (some of these were very sad and hard to read). An important point he makes, over and over: the system is not set up to protect you from con artists. You have to be careful, and if you do get conned you have to be persuasive and persistent to even get someone in law enforcement to listen to you.

He also provides a list of 14 red flags to watch out for in hopes that people who read the book will be able to protect themselves. Many of them are similar to the warnings you hear about other predators. We want to believe that con artists are "out there" somewhere, sketchy people ten thousand miles away sending spam emails. The reality is, they're often people we went to high school with, neighbors, friends of friends. They know how to love bomb people to win their affection, ply them with secrets to earn their trust, and they rarely ask for money right away. Some of them will woo you for years before they start to cash in. Most importantly, according to Walton, they don't out-think you, they out-feel you. They will identify your triggers and play on your emotions to earn your trust.

This type of thing comes up with criminals of all kinds. Ted Bundy was able to lure women to their doom because he played on their sympathies with fake injuries and relied on the fact that people tend to be polite and nice when interacting with strangers. Child predators often hold positions of trust and manipulate parents in addition to their victims. While creeps in white vans do exist, most people who are abused are abused by someone they know and trusted.

It is clear that the author of Anatomy of a Con Artist knows how to tell a story; I was not at all surprised to learn he was a reality TV producer before he started podcasting. Filled with jaw dropping stories and helpful advice, this book is much more than the "slightly more in-depth version of my podcast" that I expected to find when I picked it up. Read this, especially if you hear about scam stories and think it could never happen to you.