Book Review: There is No Ethan | Anna Akbari

This is a spoiler-free review of There is No Ethan. If you are looking for spoilers and to find out who Ethan was and what has happened since, head over to my spoiler review where I discuss the person behind the account in more depth.

In 2011, three successful and highly educated women fell victim to a con artist who went by the name Ethan Schuman. He emotionally manipulated them repeatedly, offering to meet up and then cancelling. This is the story of how they found out who he was and exposed him.

From the moment I picked up Anna Akbari’s There is No Ethan, I couldn’t put it down. This isn’t the average catfish story. In fact, this began before the debut of the groundbreaking documentary, Catfish. Why are we drawn to stories about con artists (and their victims)? Akbari posits that it’s not schadenfreude (at least not entirely), but rather an innate understanding that we aren’t invincible to manipulators like “Ethan Schuman”. If they can find a vulnerability, they’ll take it. They may already have found a way in to our lives…

What were my initial thoughts?

If I told you I read the stories of women conned by what would later popularly be called a “catfish”, who would you picture? We tend to imagine someone different from ourselves because it’s uncomfortable to imagine this happening to us. But the women conned by “Ethan Schuman” include a PhD in Sociology, a PhD in psychology (this one hit directly home for me), a successful architect, and an attorney. It includes intelligent, vibrant women with good families, support systems, careers, friends, and lives. The thing that they had in common was an openness to find love, and that is where Ethan found a vulnerability to exploit.

After I started the book, I vaguely remembered the Observer article that came out back in 2014. This book contains much more in-depth information, analysis, and updates on what has happened since 2014. At the time, it seemed novel—catfishing was relatively recent as a concept. There was the famous documentary, plus the story that broke about Notre Dame football player, Manti Te’o. People were just realizing that there was a version of this con that doesn’t go after money or sex, it attacks someone’s emotional well-being. Akbari makes a strong case for the damage this type of con can do.

How did it all start?

The book opens with an email exchange between three women in March of 2011. Anna Akbari and Gina Dallago connected through a friend of Anna’s named Matt, who Gina happened to reach out to about his shared educational history with Ethan Schulman. Matt recognized the questions and the photo from Anna’s request a few months earlier. They eventually find and include another Anna (British Anna, as she is referred to). The emails are brief but powerful. In their brevity the reader can feel the hesitance and guard that these women have up when communicating online with a stranger. This is a stark contrast to the view we see of them just months earlier, before they were cruelly manipulated.

Moving back to December of 2010, Akbari describes first engaging with a handsome, Jewish man named Ethan Schulman in an email exchange through the dating site OkCupid. Over the next six weeks, Akbari describes the extensive amount of communication between herself and Ethan, largely over email, G-chat, or text. Ethan seemed to be available at all times of the day and night. She lost sleep because she was enjoying their conversations so much. Ethan was intelligent and he spoke with elegant and thoughtful prose.

How did it progress so quickly?

With actual excerpts from their numerous online exchanges, Akbari shows (rather than tells) the reader how someone like Ethan operates and why he is so effective. He is always available, quick on his feet, and has an explanation for everything. The first time he missed their arranged meeting, he came back and described a heartbreaking esophageal cancer diagnosis and stay in the hospital. He described in detail the disease and treatment plans. He made a strong case for not wanting her to meet him in this state. It made sense, all things considered.

Over time, Akbari saw a different side of Ethan. He would flip a single comment on its head, picking a fight and berating her for perceived mistrust or cheating. He’d communicate with her until they came back to the same page, where he said all of the right things and hooked her further in. Those spikes in emotion and the dopamine hit after it is resolved can be like a drug. Ethan would also at times talk extensively about ex-girlfriends (a pattern he repeated with other women and part of how they eventually found one another). One interesting thing was that he would throw in a sexual encounter at a point when they weren’t exclusive, but also were communicating deeply enough for it to hurt. This seemed to only pull them in more, as they didn’t want to lose contact with this person who they connected with.

What was the breaking point?

After several missed connections and red flags piling up, Akbari finally called him out. Show up, or they are done. Ethan was enraged over this, and over Akbari cutting contact. A few days later, he tried to re-engage her. Meanwhile a woman named Gina had been going through an eerily similar experience with Ethan. In an effort to verify if he was who he claimed to be, she reached out to former classmates at the high school and university Ethan graduated from. This person happened to be a friend of Anna’s whom she had reached out to months earlier with the same question. He forwarded Gina’s message, setting off the fuse that would eventually uncover Ethan’s true identity.

From there, the reader gets a front seat to observe how the women connected, discovered Ethan’s true identity, confronted him, and what has transpired since. For the sake of spoilers (though this is already documented online with Ethan’s real identity), I’m going to talk about those parts over on my spoiler-review so I can really get into the person behind the account. (I’m still not over the surprise and horror, if I’m honest)

What did I think overall?

This is a well-crafted, compelling book that hooked me start to finish. Akbari displays both a vulnerability in sharing her story and an ability to offer mostly unbiased analysis on how Ethan and others like him operate (it would be impossible for her to be truly unbiased, but she approaches this with the clinical analysis of a scientist). She doesn’t apologize for believing him or offer excuses, but focuses on the blend of logic, emotion, and believing the best in another person that make good people fall prey to con artists. The text-based exchanges pepper the first two thirds of the book and easily show the reader how an intelligent, social woman could fall victim to Ethan’s tactics.

One aspect that was particularly effective was that she framed the story largely from her own perspective. She begins with how she first met and fell for Ethan, and how their relationship progressed. She describes his turn towards volatility and how it pulled her in. She also describes the oscillation between over-communication and occasional silence. Ethan loved a long-crafted email after a fight. In a way, this was something Akbari liked about him. During her six weeks with Ethan, she heard several times about his British ex-girlfriend, Anna. When she connects with Gina and realizes Ethan told Gina about her, she knew British Anna was real and was able to find her. This would be Ethan’s downfall.

After the three confront Ethan, it’s clear that British Anna is having the hardest time. I’ll talk more on that in my spoiler review, but suffice it to say that two and half years being manipulated by someone can be confusing. Even when you know it was all lies, it can be hard to let that connection go. British Anna is an important and heartbreaking example of that. From there, Akbari chronicles how they learned what happened after their confrontation, what led to the 2014 article, and what she has learned since. She ends with a blisteringly provocative discussion of this type of identity hacking and emotional manipulation—at least as damaging as financial manipulation.

Brilliant and gripping!

Thank you to Grand Central Publishing for my copy. Opinions are my own.