King’s journalism professor Dean Jobb’s new book Empire of Deception will be released by HarperCollins Canada and New York’s Algonquin books on May 19th at the historic Standard Club in downtown Chicago. The book chronicles 1920s con man Leo Koretz, who vanished from his native Chicago upon the collapse of his financial schemes and was later found living a life of luxury in Nova Scotia.
Empire of Deception has already received rave reviews. Kirkus reviews writes that Jobb “keeps readers on edge following the scam’s collapse and the worldwide manhunt, as they wait to see if Koretz might just get away with it” and Booklist calls it “a jaw-dropping, rollicking good read.”
Koretz, described by Jobb as “the Bernie Madoff of the 1920s”, convinced friends and colleagues to invest $30 million in non-existent timberland and oil fields in Panama. In 1923, he fled to Nova Scotia, where he assumed a new identity as a retired financier-turned-literary critic.
Jobb’s is the first book to chronicle Koretz. Previous releases by professor Jobb include The Acadians: A People’s Story of Exile and Triumph in 2005, Calculated Risk: Greed, Politics and the Westray Tragedy, in 1994 and the widely used textbook Media Law for Canadian Journalists.
To read more about Empire of Deception, visit deanjobb.com
