Playing Dead A Journey Through the World of Death Fraud

Playing Dead : A Journey Through the World of Death Fraud
ISBN: 9781476739342
Publication Date: 15 August 2017

A delightful read for anyone tantalized by the prospect of disappearing without a trace. Erik Larson, New York Times bestselling author of Dead Wake

Delivers all the lo-fi spy shenanigans and caught-red-handed schadenfreude youre hoping for. NPR

A lively romp. The Boston Globe

Grim fun. The New York Times

Brilliant topic, absorbing book. The Seattle Times

The most literally escapist summer read you could hope for. The Paris Review

Is it still possible to fake your own death in the twenty-first century With six figures of student loan debt, Elizabeth Greenwood was tempted to find out. So off she sets on a darkly comic foray into the world of death fraud, where for $30,000 a consultant can make you disappearbut your suspicious insurance company might hire a private detective to dig up your coffin...only to find it filled with rocks.

Greenwood tracks down a British man who staged a kayaking accident and then returned to live in his own house while all his neighbors thought he was dead. She takes a call from Michael Jackson (no, hes not deador so her new acquaintances would have her believe), stalks message boards for people contemplating pseudocide, and gathers intel on black market morgues in the Philippines, where she may or may not obtain some fraudulent goodies of her own. Along the way, she learns that love is a much less common motive than money, and that making your death look like a drowning virtually guarantees that youll be caught. (Disappearing while hiking, however, is a way great to go.)

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