Guest Post – The Con: An Organized Crime Cozy Mystery by Jackie Layton @joyfuljel @dollycas

About The Con

The Con: An Organized Crime Cozy Mystery
Cozy Mystery
2nd in Series
Setting – Georgia
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Level Best Books (August 27, 2024)
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 280 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1685127266
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1685127268
Digital ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0DDBFJGPK

Professional organizer Kate Sloan is hired by Ben Houser to organize his office at Seaside Hideaway Resort on Fox Island. Ben tells everybody he’s planning to revamp the resort. Ben throws money around and convinces people to invest with him. The first problem is, Ben’s a con man. The second problem is, Kate finds his dead body.

The killer believes Kate has incriminating evidence, and she must solve the mystery before she’s next on the hitman’s list.

About Jackie Layton

Jackie Layton is the author of cozy mysteries with Spunky Southern Sleuths. Her stories are set in Texas, Georgia, and South Carolina. She lives on the coast of South Carolina, where she enjoys walks on the beach and golf cart rides around the marsh. Reading, gardening, and traveling are some of her favorite hobbies.

Jackie always keeps a notebook handy to write down ideas for future stories. Dateline and American Greed are two ways she gets ideas. She’s also a people watcher, and that can giver her ideas for stories or even a thread in a book.

Author Links

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Website: https://jackielaytoncozyauthor.com/

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Guest Post With Jackie

Have you ever been the victim of a con? Ruse, swindle, fleece, bunco, and gaff are a few fun synonyms for con. Stiff, sucker, victimize, rip off, and shakedown are some gloomy synonyms.

In the beginning, these bad people performed confidence tricks, so they were called confidence men. A con artist would gain a person’s confidence, then cheat them out of their money, and this became known as a confidence trick.

A con artist is a manipulator who tricks an individual into believing a lie. They deceive people into thinking they can make easy money, but in fact, the con artist steals it.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but sometimes the con artist only has to trick one person to get the sting started. The first victim becomes invested and does well. He makes lots of money and gives credit to the con artist. Then, Victim #1 tells Victim #2 about this great opportunity to make money. Victim #2 is friends with, and believes, Victim #1, and he invests in the ruse as well. At this point, the con artist barely has to do any work to hook this victim.

Meanwhile, the hustler, seeks out new people to con, and process continues. Over and over.

There are many famous con artists, and you’ve probably heard of some.

Charles Ponzi, is the man referenced when you hear somebody is a victim of a Ponzi scheme. It’s a method of cheating people by claiming to guarantee big returns on their investments. The thing is no money is invested. The first investors are paid with money from new investors.

You may also know about Frank Abagnale. He committed many cons against small businesses and individuals. He was arrested and convicted, but he later became an author and security consultant. The movie, Catch Me If You Can, is based on him.

How about Bernie Madoff? He ran a Ponzi scheme that netted him close to sixty-five BILLION dollars before he was caught in 2008. People had suspected him for years, but it took time to prove his crimes.

Elizabeth Bigley, also known as Cassie Chadwick, was from Canada. She began coming fraud at the age of thirteen. When she came to America, she continued to con people out of money and pretended to be a psychic. Her biggest con was when she claimed to be the illegitimate child of Andrew Carnegie. She defrauded several banks with her biggest scheme.

As far as modern-day con artists go, there’s Anna Sorokin. She came to America, claiming to be a wealthy German heiress named Anna Delvey. She wasn’t. She was convicted of swindling friends, hotels, and banks. She’s out now, and she’s on Dancing With the Stars.

When the con falls apart, Victim 1 is usually angry at the loss of money. Victim 1 also usually feels guilty and embarrassed that he/she pulled friends and family into the con. There’s lots of heartache and anger.

When the con starts to fall apart, the conperson begins to grow desperate. What will it take to prolong the scam? What will it take to escape the authorities?

I read The Confidence Game by Maria Konnikova, and I have probably watched every episode of American Greed, all in the name of research. Recently, we saw a man on the news, and I told my husband I’d seen him on an episode of American Greed. I double-checked, and I was right. It’s eye-opening what people will do and who they’ll target.

We recently had a friend meet a man through an online dating site. The more I heard the more scared I got. I told my husband the guy was following a script of American Greed in how he approached our friend. Right down to asking for money then disappearing. I did a deep dive into the man and couldn’t find anything that made me feel better, but he did an excellent job of convincing our friend he loved her. I’m not sure if we know the end of this story yet, but I’m heartbroken for our friend. I would love to be wrong though. It would be great if he appeared and was legit, and it would make me very happy to admit I was wrong.

Let’s change gears. I’d like to share a bit about The Con. It’s the second book in An Organized Crime Cozy Mystery series.

When a conman is found murdered at Fox Island’s resort, Seaside Hideaway, Kate Sloan begins to look at his background. Kate is a professional organizer, and she has recently been in meetings with Ben Hauser about working on his office at the resort. Kate and Ben weren’t good friends, but she’s sad about his passing, and she’ll investigate his death.

You can probably tell that I enjoy learning about cons, and it was fun to write a story about a con man. Thanks for coming by and spending time with us today.