flim flam man book review

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• Flim-Flam Man: The True Story of My...

Flim-Flam Man: The True Story of My Father's Counterfeit Life

Jennifer Vogel's dad was not like other dads. Sure he loved Jennifer and her siblings, remembered birthdays, took them fishing and on vacations. But John Vogel was a criminal, a conman and a crook. In FLIM-FLAM MAN Jennifer Vogel shares the story of her complicated relationship with her father --- his life of crime and secrecy, his affection for her and his bloody death at the end of a police chase almost a decade ago.

Estranged from her father for years when he died, Vogel's guilt and sadness fuel this memoir. And so does her love for him and her understanding of his outlaw ways. She tries to get closer to him by examining his childhood (his father was absent and his mother emotionally distant) and his other relationships. Still, this is not a family history in the traditional sense. Vogel gives the reader sketches, impressions of her family more so than details and facts. The result is emotional, fascinating and quite personal.

Vogel's parents divorced when she was a child. Her mother, left to raise three children alone, was the disciplinarian. Her father's mystique grew. The children spent summers with him, driving in his fancy Cadillacs, spending time at his cabin, entertaining guests and having fun. But over the years Vogel pieced together truths about her father. Her mother told her early on that he was delinquent in his child support. To Vogel, his gifts and personality seemed to make up for this somehow. Yet how was she to balance out his other crimes such as arson? And how was she to make sense of the fact that her father had served prison time as a young man for a violent crime? Or what about his justification to rob a corporate retail chain for sociopolitical reasons by creating and passing counterfeit money? Or the armed bank robberies? How could his rap sheet sum up the creative and eccentric man she knew and loved?

It is not just Vogel's father's faults that are laid bare. Jennifer Vogel exposes herself as well. Despite his shortcomings, or perhaps because of them, Vogel felt a propinquity with her father's life of crime; she understood the need to subvert the system and had a distrust of authority. She eventually channels those tendencies in a way her father was never able to, and as she grew up she steered clear of the choices and mistakes her father made.

Moving between childhood scenes and 1995, the year her father was on the run from the FBI and Federal Marshals, Vogel tells the tale of her family with honesty and even humor. At first glance this appears to be a family unlike most, but she proves they share much in common with families across America. FLIM-FLAM MAN is the poignant story of a challenging father-daughter relationship. It is also about the struggle for the American dream: in John Vogel there was a not uncommon sense of alienation coupled with the not uncommon sense of entitlement. Here we read about a man who makes disastrous and dangerous choices his entire life, yet is also a loving and charming father. It is easy to understand why Vogel is so conflicted about him.

This is not exactly a book about forgiveness or recovery or anything quite as simple as that. Jennifer Vogel's short book is emotionally complicated but a joy to read. Both the joy and the complication seems a fitting tribute to the man presented in its pages: a loving and lovable father, and a career criminal. FLIM-FLAM MAN is a moving, interesting and highly recommended debut.

Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman on January 22, 2011

Flim-Flam Man: The True Story of My Father's Counterfeit Life by Jennifer Vogel

• Publication Date: September 5, 2005
• Genres: Biography , Nonfiction
• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Scribner
• ISBN-10: 074321708X
• ISBN-13: 9780743217088

FLIM-FLAM MAN: A True Family History

Jennifer vogel, . . scribner, $23 (224pp) isbn 978-0-7432-1707-1.

Reviewed on: 10/13/2003

Genre: Nonfiction

Open Ebook - 224 pages - 978-1-4391-3145-9

Paperback - 224 pages - 978-0-7432-1708-8

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Flim-Flam Man

The true story of my father's counterfeit life.

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About The Book

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About The Author

Jennifer Vogel worked as a writer and reporter in Minneapolis for seven years before moving to Seattle, where she was editor in chief of The Stranger . She moved back to Minneapolis in 2003.

Product Details

• Publisher: Scribner (September 5, 2005)
• Length: 224 pages
• ISBN13: 9780743217088

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Raves and Reviews

"Vogel evokes the dual nature of our intimate lives as well as the struggle between the straight and the criminal....[R]efreshingly well-paced." -- San Francisco Chronicle

"[Vogel's] story, a dark eulogy, fascinates." -- Newsday

"Alternately hilarious and heartbreaking." -- Time Out New York

"Vogel's masterful account...[w]ill haunt readers for days." -- Kirkus Reviews (starred)

"Original, tragic, and heartbreaking in the way only true life can be." -- Entertainment Weekly

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• Book Cover Image (jpg): Flim-Flam Man Trade Paperback 9780743217088

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Darleen Bailey Beard

Children's book author, about darleen, 2022 letter to you, raves and reviews, darleen's brochure, book activities, will rogers, annie glover is not a..., operation clean sweep, babbs switch story, the flimflam man, pumpkin man, book ordering, book order form, school visits, say cheese scholarship, planning an author visit, choose a session, writing workshops, math, history & science, speaking fees, visited schools, plan a visit, quick introductions, q&a and other tips, publicity photo gallery, announcement posters, stick to reading bulletin, hang out with db bulletin, darleen poster, darleen's coming soon, stick 2 reading poster, scavenger hunt.

Based on a true story, Darleen Bailey Beard's sparkling tale is told by tenderhearted Bobbie Jo, who embraces both a bully and a flimflam man and at the same time preserves her town's pride and pleasure.

Eileen Christelow's gentle but lively drawings complete the picture. Eileen has written and illustrated many books for children, including  Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed .

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A return of the flim-flam man (1965), perhaps somewhat more sentimental and less successful than the original, but...

READ REVIEW

THE FLIM-FLAM MAN AND THE APPRENTICE GRIFTER

by Guy Owen ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 25, 1972

A return of the flim-flam man (1965), perhaps somewhat more sentimental and less successful than the original, but nonetheless an entertaining novel in the southern style, full of tall tales and moonshine whiskey and revival meetings. Curley Treadaway, the flim-flam man's young sidekick, gets bailed out of jail (for swindling, selling ""potent"" medicines and the like) by Bonnie Lee Packard's father, only to find that what awaits him is no honeymoon with his true love, but something little worse than a chain gang, as he works for half the folks in Ellers Bend to pay for his misdoings. By and by, his good graces and shenanigans charm everyone and he's on the road to redemption and respectability, when -- lo and behold -- who shows up but Mordecai Jones, the Flim-Flam Man. And off they go to see the world and, incidentally, make Curley a singing star. After a number of spectacular hijinks -- conning the stingy and outwitting the law -- Curley does walk a rather cheerless road to fame and stardom -- until Bonnie Lee tricks the trickster into domesticity. An amusing novel, with no pretensions as to its seriousness.

Pub Date: Oct. 25, 1972

Page Count: -

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1972

Categories: FICTION

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Flim-Flam Man: A True Family History Kindle Edition

• Print length 226 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Scribner
• Publication date May 21, 2010
• File size 427 KB
• Page Flip Enabled
• Word Wise Enabled
• Enhanced typesetting Enabled
• See all details

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From publishers weekly, from booklist, about the author, excerpt. © reprinted by permission. all rights reserved..

Dad wasn't home that day. For reasons yet unclear to me, he came home less and less often as the months passed. It got so his returns felt like visits, his departures shadows that kept his place at the kitchen table. By winter, he'd all but abandoned us. I remember seeing my father only twice after the snow covered the ground. One time, he and Uncle Tom showed u...

Product details

• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B003N9BC8Y
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Scribner (May 21, 2010)
• Publication date ‏ : ‎ May 21, 2010
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• File size ‏ : ‎ 427 KB
• Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
• Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
• Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
• X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
• Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 226 pages
• #1,505 in Law Enforcement Biographies
• #1,792 in Biographies & Memoirs of Criminals
• #4,429 in Crime & Criminal Biographies

About the author

Jennifer vogel.

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Customers find the writing quality good, with an even flow of words. They describe the book as brilliant, lyrical, and a real page-turner.

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Customers find the writing quality of the book good, with an even flow of words. They also describe it as a brilliant and lyrical book.

"...A brilliant and lyrical book about a fascinating man and his daughter." Read more

" Great writing and even flow of words. I enjoyed her style. But since it was about the author’s life I have to make a judgement about her actions...." Read more

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"...on the run with her criminal father, is poignant, captivating,and brilliant ...." Read more

"This book is a real page-turner . I saw that movie, when I was 50% done with reading the book. As usual, I preferred the book over the movie...." Read more

"A true tale of a family's struggle. Great reAd !..." Read more

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