The Runner: A True Account of the Amazing Lies and Fantastical Adventures of the Ivy League Impostor James Hogue

This book seems particularly relevant right now, with the literary world increasingly falling victim -- practically once a month -- to frauds, plagiarists and con artists. It's the true life story of a particularly colorful specimen. In his late 20's, basically a drifter living in Colorado, James Hogue decided to recreate himself as a charismatic genius and sports hero -- and he used his new identity to hustle his way into Princeton University as an undergrad. He was a complete fake, but as Samuels shows, that doesn't make him any less accomplished. His insane story tells you as much about our times, and about our elite institutions, as it does about the peculiar twists and turns of one individual's particular psyche. In America, the land of self-invention, the con man is often king, and this small book -- just about the same length as The Great Gatsby, one of Hogue's inspirations -- is a wonderful and strangely moving portrait of a true American original. David Samuels is well-known as an award-winning magazine journalist, and this, his first book, shows him at the top of his form. I recommend it highly.

From his profile of Yasser Arafat to his recent article in the new Atlantic on paparazzi, David Samuels' great subject is the "comedian" - or, if you prefer, the conman; that is, that figure who recognizes our gullibility, sentimentality and ruthlessly takes advantage of it. James Hogue, the hero, or anti-hero, of Samuels' first book is in a sense the author's ur-comic, a con who pulled one over on one of the great and high institutions of American culture, Princeton. Hogue might not like how he turns out here, but thanks to Samuels he's been raised to the level of a literary legend, an American prototype - like Melville's Confidence Man, like the man who's going to represent the Dems in the 2008 election. This is a great book.

This is a totally fascinating book. People who have actually read this book love it. Ignore the one star reviews from the friends of the subject. David Samuels didn't get to be a writer for The New Yorker, Harpers, The Atlantic, etc by being a boring writer or a bad reporter. He sits squarely in the great tradition of new journalism pioneered by Joan Didion and Tom Wolfe. He is part of a dying breed of magazine journalists who bring craft and imagination to stories that lesser writers ream of. He writes beautifully. He tells a great story. This is book is smart, engaging, and insightful. What more could you ask for?

I couldn't put this book down, I finished it in one long sitting. It's an incredibly well-written & thoughtful look at a fascinating story, and a fascinating subject: the question of how sociopaths can pull off outrageous deceptions because they're simply not playing by the interpersonal rules that most of us assume are in effect.

Samuels has produced a minor classic of American journalism, a story too juicy and too much fun to be fiction. People spend their lives inventing themselves, and novelists can't compete with a self-invention like Hogue. "The Runner" captures him brilliantly.