Every journalist, in Janet Malcolm's judgment, is "a kind of confidence man, preying on people's vanity, ignorance or loneliness, gaining their trust and betraying them without remorse". That harsh claim certainly requires qualification, but she was reacting indignantly to a particularly nasty case of hypocrisy, betrayal and revenge. This disturbing, very well written book (first published in the New Yorker) tells the story of Joe McGinnis, the author of The Selling of the President, 1968, who insinuated himself into the legal team defending Jeffrey MacDonald, a physician accused of murdering his pregnant wife and two young daughters. Even after a verdict of guilty, McGinnis wrote letters to retain MacDonald's trust while writing a book of condemnation. The murderer sued for fraud - and won.