Best friends (and occasional lovers) Ezra and Orson are teetering on top of the world after founding a company that promises instant enlightenment in this thrilling caper about scams, schemes, and the absurdity of the American Dream. At seventeen, Ezra Green doesn’t have a lot going for him: he’s shorter than average, snaggle-toothed, internet-addicted, and halfway to being legally blind. He’s also on his way to Last Chance Camp, the final stop before juvie. But Ezra’s summer at Last Chance turns life-changing when he meets Orson, brilliant and Adonis-like with a mind for hustling. Together, the two embark upon what promises to be a fruitful career of scam artistry. But when they try to pull off their biggest scam yet—Nulife, a corporation that promises its consumers a lifetime of bliss—things start to spin wildly out of control. Searing and charming, with the suspense of The Talented Mr. Ripley, the decadence of The Great Gatsby, and the wit of Succession, Confidence is a story for anyone who knows that the American Dream is just another pyramid scheme.
Rafael Frumkin is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and the Medill School of Journalism. His first novel, The Comedown, was published by Henry Holt in 2018 to critical acclaim. His Collection, Bugsy & Other Stories, is forthcoming. He lives with his partner, two cats, and one dog in Carbondale, Illinois, where he is an assistant professor of creative writing at Southern Illinois University.
Frumkin will be in conversation with Jeannie Vanasco. Vanasco is the author of the memoirs Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl —which was named a New York Times Editors' Choice and a best book of the year by TIME, Esquire, Kirkus, among others—and The Glass Eye, which Poets & Writers called one of the five best literary nonfiction debuts of the year. Her third book, A Silent Treatment, is forthcoming. Her essays have appeared in the Believer, the New York Times, the Times Literary Supplement, and elsewhere. They cover subjects as wide-ranging as artificial eyes in fiction, artists named after dead siblings, nineteenth-century house-moving, and the history of erasure literature. Her poetry honors include an Emerging Poets Fellowship from Poets House and an Amy Award from Poets & Writers. Born and raised in Sandusky, Ohio, she lives in Baltimore and is an associate professor of English at Towson University.
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