Their cat-and-mouse game lasted throughout the 1920s and ’30s,
but despite Fishbein’s efforts Brinkley prospered wildly.
When he ran for governor of Kansas, he invented campaigning techniques still used in modern politics.
Thumbing his nose at American regulators, he built the world’s most powerful radio transmitter just across the Rio Grande to offer sundry cures, and killed or maimed patients by the score, yet his warped genius produced innovations in broadcasting that endure to this day.
By introducing country music and blues to the nation, Brinkley also became a seminal force in rock ’n’ roll.
In short, he is the most creative criminal this country has ever produced.
Culminating in a decisive courtroom confrontation that pit Brinkley against his nemesis Fishbein, Charlatan is a marvelous portrait of a boundlessly audacious rogue on the loose in an America that was ripe for the bamboozling.
344 pages.