"The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry" by Jon Ronson

Quickly, off the top of your head, how many psychopaths have you seen in your lifetime? Three? Two? One? None? Well, the truth is that you have seen hundreds… maybe even thousands of them… heck, chances are that you’ve seen one today when you were walking down the street.

It is estimated that one in every hundred people is actually a psychopath a person who doesn’t feel empathy, is charming, manipulative, seductive, and worst of all, delusional.

Jon Ronson is a man who decided to explore the phenomenon of psychopaths in modern society, and The Psychopath Test is the result of his journey.

In his book, Jon Ronson describes how the investigation a hoax targeting the world’s premier scientists led him to psychopaths. He documents his discussion with a high-ranking psychologist who firmly believes that most businessmen, leaders and politicians are indeed psychopaths who have learned to function seamlessly in society.

Ronson also met a patient inside an asylum who was described as a psychopath, but acted like a simple troubled youth… which led him to realize that the real, dangerous psychopaths of society are those who can’t be differentiated from others. Along the way, Jon interviews a former Death Squad leader committed to an institution for fraud and a famous CEO who was taking pleasure from firing people.

His research takes him from underground LSD-based research projects all the way to genuine attempts to understand how serial killers see the world. This book is one of the most interesting reads I have had in a while as it makes a very convincing case for there being way more psychopaths than we believe.

All in all, this book will come to show you that even the most normal and seemingly-sane people are characterized by their level of madness.

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Jon Ronson Personal site Jon Ronson is a journalist of Welsh ethnicity, a radio presenter, a documentary filmmaker, a so-called gonzo journalist, and of course, an author, who as it happens specializes in non-fiction. The Men Who Stare at Goats, one of his more popular books, was actually adapted into a major movie, and some of his other works have certainly ensured he be noticed, and those include The Psychopath Test and Lost at Sea.