Where is Ruja Ignatova, the self-styled cryptoqueen, hiding?

This is a depressing book. It’s a reminder of everything that is sick, broken and generally maledicted about the human condition. It’s also a book based on a podcast, which brings difficulties of its own.

To cut a very long story short, The Missing Cryptoqueen tells the true story of a Bulgarian crook named Ruja Ignatova, the self-styled cryptoqueen of the book’s title. In 2014, she set up a pyramid scheme-cum-multi-level-marketing scam based on a fake cryptocurrency called OneCoin. In 2017, having swindled people out of billions of pounds, dollars, euros and just about every other currency on the planet, and with the authorities closing in, Ignatova suddenly went missing. Her whereabouts remain unknown.

It’s a great story and a spectacular con. Jamie Bartlett’s unenviable task is to try to make sense of the entire enterprise, explaining the mysteries and complexities of cryptocurrency and blockchains, investigating the use of complex company structures and the function of foreign exchange platforms, as well as sketching in the involvement of a cast of hundreds of supporting characters.