A NEW YORK TIMES MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2026
‘BARRAGÁN WRITES WITH IMPECCABLE EMPATHY . . . COMPELLINGLY READABLE’ BARBARA DEMICK
‘ASTONISHING . . . I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. A TOUR DE FORCE’ JON LEE ANDERSON
When his mother fell for an ‘American soldier’ who promised to send gold bars to their Madrid apartment, Carlos Barragán found himself with an unexpected window into the shadowy world of online romance fraud. He set off on a journey to find his mother’s scammer, but what he discovered was much bigger: a world of young Nigerian men who drag themselves out of destitution by catfishing lonely hearts in the US and Europe, in the process building a dizzying local economy from their phones.
The Yahoo Boys follows four scammers in Ikotun – one of Lagos’s poorest neighbourhoods, a scant ten miles from the gleaming heart of the megacity. Through their twisting fortunes, Barragán discovers the psychological tactics they perfect, the economic desperation that drives them, and the moral dilemmas they face. A work of radical empathy, this astonishing narrative nonfiction debut reveals the human face behind a global phenomenon, and shows how isolation in the West and poverty in Nigeria are just two sides of the same screen.
‘BOTH INTIMATELY PERSONAL AND GLOBALLY RELEVANT’ DIPO FALOYIN
‘AN ENVIABLE FEAT OF REPORTAGE AND WRITING – AS INTREPID AS IT IS SYMPATHETIC’ GIDEON LEWIS-KRAUS
‘BARRAGÁN WRITES WITH IMPECCABLE EMPATHY . . . COMPELLINGLY READABLE’ BARBARA DEMICK
‘ASTONISHING . . . I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. A TOUR DE FORCE’ JON LEE ANDERSON
When his mother fell for an ‘American soldier’ who promised to send gold bars to their Madrid apartment, Carlos Barragán found himself with an unexpected window into the shadowy world of online romance fraud. He set off on a journey to find his mother’s scammer, but what he discovered was much bigger: a world of young Nigerian men who drag themselves out of destitution by catfishing lonely hearts in the US and Europe, in the process building a dizzying local economy from their phones.
The Yahoo Boys follows four scammers in Ikotun – one of Lagos’s poorest neighbourhoods, a scant ten miles from the gleaming heart of the megacity. Through their twisting fortunes, Barragán discovers the psychological tactics they perfect, the economic desperation that drives them, and the moral dilemmas they face. A work of radical empathy, this astonishing narrative nonfiction debut reveals the human face behind a global phenomenon, and shows how isolation in the West and poverty in Nigeria are just two sides of the same screen.
‘BOTH INTIMATELY PERSONAL AND GLOBALLY RELEVANT’ DIPO FALOYIN
‘AN ENVIABLE FEAT OF REPORTAGE AND WRITING – AS INTREPID AS IT IS SYMPATHETIC’ GIDEON LEWIS-KRAUS
Reviews
Carlos Barragán traveled to Lagos, Nigeria in search of the con artist who had romanced his divorced mother. He found himself submerged in the sleepless, hard-partying world of the Yahoo Boys - a subculture fueled by music, booze and drugs, as well as poverty and ambition and even love. Barragán writes with impeccable empathy about both the scammers and their lonelyheart victims . . . A compellingly readable exploration of the psychology of the romance scam
[An] outstanding debut . . . There are plenty of eye-popping details, yet the book is most noteworthy for its affecting humanisation of both the Yahoo Boys - impoverished young men scrambling to survive - and their victims, made vulnerable by the West's loneliness epidemic. A remarkably empathetic view of both sides of the con
If Carlos Barragán's The Yahoo Boys were merely a picaresque tour of the world of Nigerian scammers, it would have been worth it for the entertainment value alone. In his hands, however, this is a technically sophisticated, emotionally acute, and sociologically wise exploration of a shadow economy driven by devices, loneliness, and global inequality. It's an enviable feat of reportage and writing - as intrepid as it is sympathetic
Fascinating and important. Carlos Barragán has constructed something full of warmth and empathy, both intimately personal and globally relevant
Carlos Barragán has nailed it, capturing the mystery of internet romance scamming. He is a remarkable ethnographer, filled with empathy for both victimizers and victims: impoverished Nigerian adolescents full of dreams, and his own mother, who yearns for love and companionship. Most importantly, we learn that both sides of this tragic global equation suffer deeply. I wish all anthropologists could write as grippingly, empathetically and clearly as does the reporter Barragán
I have found few books lately as immediately compelling as Barragán's . . . As an unexpected, fresh take on the bewilderingly quicksilver world we live in, The Yahoo Boys is a tour-de-force
A provocative view of the grift from inside the grifters' unenviable world
Through four sensitively crafted portraits of young Nigerian scammers, Barragán shows us young men caught between hard luck and hard choices . . . A wonderful accomplishment
Barragán's first book deftly weaves together the complicated legacy of the West African enslavement trade and British colonial rule, the corruption and rampant inflation of modern-day Lagos, and the individual life stories of several Yahoo Boys to present a holistic overview of the methods, motives, and means by which romance scammers flourish in Nigeria