The Modern Con Man: How to Get Something for Nothing | 
| Author: Todd Robbins
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA
Category: Book
List Price: $16.95
Buy New: $9.76
You Save: $7.19 (42%)
New (28) Used (8) from $9.65
Avg. Customer Rating:  5 reviews
Sales Rank: 63652
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.1 x 1
ISBN: 159691453X
Dewey Decimal Number: 364.163
EAN: 9781596914537
ASIN: 159691453X
Publication Date: April 1, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Cons, bar bets, card games, and general chicanery for the natural-born prankster.
Whether it’s winning $50 on a bar bet, scoring seats closer to the fifty-yard line, or finagling a free meal, The Modern Con Man ensures that aspiring low-risk grifters will always come out on top. Filled with humorous facts and tables, a glossary of con terms, illustrations, the history of the con, and easy-to-follow swindles, this is the perfect gift for the hidden flim-flam artist in your life.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Fun, but Pretty Weak - Does Anyone Fall For This Stuff? June 8, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
This was an interesting book, and I read through it pretty quickly. But honestly, this has nothing to do with conning people. It's all about bar bets and tricks.
The book details a lot of different tricks that you can do in various situations, like making a bet that you can wrap a normal-sized piece of paper around your head, or betting that you can roll a cue ball underneath a pool stick laid across a pool table.
But some of them are exceedingly lame, and if anyone ever wins a bet with them, I'll buy him a beer himself. Like in the aforementioned pool table trick: You lay a pool stick across a pool table, then make a bet that you can roll a cue ball underneath it. Of course, a cue ball will never fit in the two inch space between the stick and the pool table surface. So the trick? You roll it on the floor. Har har. Technically it's "under" the pool stick. The author would have you believe that you'll be winning money all over town with this trick. My guess is that you have a better chance of either looking like a total idiot or getting beat up.
This is insulting, in other words. Nobody is going to pay on such an idiotic bet.
And in the end, none of these are "cons" any more than telling someone a riddle they can't figure out his a con. They're not cons, they're just common parlor tricks, and some of them are very lame, even for parlor tricks.
 Finally, the Real Work... April 20, 2008
5 out of 8 found this review helpful
Finally, a real book for real con-men. Most of these kinds of books are written jokingly, not this one. Inside MODERN CON MAN you will find some very useful information, and even more between the lines.I have about 6000 books on magic and another 1500 of what are commanly refered to in the underground as "crook books". MODERN CON MAN falls into the later catagory and I'm proud to ad it to the collection.If you're a con artist or would like to become one, get yourelf a copy of MODERN CON MAN. And don't just look at it as buying another book, look at it as an investment in your education (I've got a few more for you if you're serious, too).MODERN CON MAN is a book that will pay for itself many times over if you use the information. Con men love greedy people and the information in this book will show you how to exploit the greedy person's nature to it's fullest.I've found the best way to con someone is to make the victim think he's on the inside with you. Explain to him how you and he will con this third party. Then after the fact he's too scared to go to the police because he is a "conspirator" and would get arrested right along with you.Fear, lust, greed, and sympathy; these are the tools of the con artists trade. I have learned some of the best kept secrets in books on sales and selling.But I'm getting off track here. In addition to MODERN CON MAN by Todd Robbins here are a handfull of other books for you to study and learn the tricks of the trade:THE BIG CON by David Maurer. This one is sill in print because it's so good. Bruce Geller used it as a textbook to write all of the old Mission Impossible television shows back in the '60s. It was originally published in 1940 but the information is just as valuable today as it was back then, just use your imagination to hatch new schemes from the ideas presented here.HOW TO CHEAT AT EVERYTHING by Simon Lovell. This is the con artists bible. If ever there was a book that contained "every-trick-in-the-book" this would be it. So much information your head will explode with possibilities.HOW TO BECOME A PROFESSIONAL CON ARTIST by Dennis Marlock. Just what the title implies. This book is published by a company called Paladin Press in Boulder, Colorado [...] Get a copy of their catalog, it has dozens and dozens of books for the aspiring con artist. They just published one this month on how to become a televangelist and all the tricks of the trade for taking your congregation to the cleaners.And remember kids, in crime nothing succeeds like originality. So take the information you learn in these books and twist these schemes into something new and original that they never see coming.MODERN CON MAN by Todd Robbins is a great place to start. And if someone you con ever comes unglued and tries to start trouble, use this ruse: Explain to him that now that he knows how the scheme works he can now go out and perpetrate it on someone else. Explain to him how you haven't really conned him, you've provided him with an insider's education tught to him by a true legend in the business...you!You'd be surprised how often this short-circuits the situation and the victim actually walks away smiling...and you are left with your teeth intact.Enjoy!
From the NEW YORK OBSERVER April 10, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
"A handy, illustrated manual for would-be artists of deception! Todd Robbins is a con man and a good one at that... He parts fools from money with the precision of a surgeon. Even more enjoyable, though, than the nostalgic whisky-and-shadow-soaked hinterland the book evokes is the sinister pleasure Mr. Robbins takes in swindling. At heart, all con men are Manichaean, and Mr. Robbins is no exception. "The world is...separated into the Deceivers and the Deceived," he writes. "The sooner you decide which group you want to be in, the better off you will be."
Fun for young and old April 9, 2008
10 out of 10 found this review helpful
So long as you don't make these swindles a part of your income stream, this little book can be great fun. They are educational in a couple of ways, first to show you how the trickery works and second to teach you something about human nature: gullibility, greed, empathy, friendship, and suspicion.
A few of the tricks include:
Winning at Nim (a nice example of the binary system in action).
Tie a necktie without letting go of the ends.
Hold a lit match upside down for 20 seconds without getting burned.
Robbins is something of a New York institution. He runs a sideshow school on Coney Island which will teach you glass eating and fire eating, and a nail-in-the-noggin bit, a routine known in the trade as the human blockhead. He's also put on quite an entertaining off-Broadway show called ''Carnival Knowledge''.
You may not want to become a performer, but these tricks can be very entertaining for "Children of All Ages!!!"
Robert C. Ross, 2008
It's Only A Little Wicked April 8, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
THis latest book by Todd Robbins can earn you a living..if you have the guts to do it.However,if you'd rather just take it slow and easy Todd shows you dozens of ways you can bamboozle,baffle and BS your friends and acquaintances and garner yourself a free beer, coffee, meal or whatever.You'll find it fun and educational and can rest assured you will never suffer from the dreaded 'Cenosillicaphobia'.Additionally, you will never be made to feel gullible again (by the way..did you know the word gullible isn't even in the dictionary?)
I'm a collector of books about con artists, scams, schemes and scoundrels and this book ranks very high on my list. I'll bet you a buck you'll will find this book enjoyable if you enjoy this kind of book..Have fun.
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