Scams, Scandals and Skulduggery - Tapa blanda

Since 1998, Andreas Schroeder has been a regular contributor to CBC-Radio’s “Basic Black,” entertaining listeners with outrageous – and always very funny – tales of daring scams and rip-offs. In Scams, Scandals, and Skulduggery he has collected seventeen of the stories that received the greatest listener response when they were broadcast – what he calls a kind of “Best of Basic Black Scams, Volume 1.”

Stories Include:

Running Away with Mona: How a canny forger and his partner pre-sold six copies of the Mona Lisa to wealthy and secretive collectors – and then arranged the theft of the original to cover their tracks.

For Export Only: How an enterprising cattle breeder “exported” ten cows from Southern to Northern Ireland a thousand times.

The Flea That Roared: How the Grand Principality of Outer Baldonia (off the coast of Nova Scotia) declared war on the U.S.S.R.

The Great Purolator Paper Caper: How a “gang that couldn’t shoot straight” nevertheless managed to pull off the largest single heist of cash in American history.

These tales, and many others, told in Andreas Schroeder’s mischievously deadpan and subversively gleeful style, are sure to delight his many fans and make fans of new readers.

Andreas Schroeder has published over a dozen books, including File of Uncertainties (poetry), The Late Man (short fiction), Dust Ship Glory (novel), and The Eleventh Commandment (translation). His memoir, Shaking It Rough, was nominated for the Governor General’s Award in 1976. His fiction and poetry have been included in over forty anthologies, and his byline has appeared in most Canadian magazines and newspapers. In 1991 he was awarded the Canadian Association of Journalists’ Best Investigative Journalism Award.

In addition to his writing, he has been a regular broadcaster for CBC Radio – most notably on “Basic Black” – and a tireless crusader for writers’ benefits in C