Ask any extremely online person about Caroline Calloway, and there’s little guarantee of the exact rant you’ll get in return… but it’ll certainly be passionate. 

Of all the internet personalities, she may well be one of the most divisive. There are scattered camps: the voracious fans who first lapped up her fantastical microblogs about balls and boys at Cambridge University, those who like her in a sort of distantly ironic, meta way, the haters charting her every contradictory statement on Twitter or the SmolBeanSnark subreddit, the people who don’t fully know her story but have soaked up enough discourse to view her as a merciless grifter, the obsessed viewers of every car crash controversy, the list goes on (and on, and on). 

In short, her public image is a thing more slippery than a Matisse reproduction doused in Snake Oil. Unless you are, as we say, very online, it’s difficult to get a grasp of who this woman is and why you should be remotely interested in what she has to say. But for those who want to try, here’s a (very) brief and abridged recap. 

Caroline Calloway started out her internet life by posting lengthy Instagram captions about life as an American attending the University of Cambridge. She racked up a loyal following and turned this into a massive ($500,000) book deal. Alas, she then couldn’t deliver said book, and needed to pay back the advance. To continue connecting with her big fanbase, she worked on being an influencer and, as part of this, decided to host what she described as ‘creativity workshops’, selling tickets for $165. She shared the experience of doing this – including struggles to deliver on the promised flower crowns and salads, cancellations of locations, the difficulties of having ordered more than a thousand mason jars – which was then screenshotted and posted on Twitter by writer Kayleigh Donaldson, who described the events as a “scam” and triggered a barrage of articles decreeing Calloway a scammer and her workshops the equivalent of Fyre Festival. 

Still with us? Let’s continue. And reminder, this is a whistle-stop tour. There’s so much we can’t cover. 

So, Calloway was effectively ‘cancelled’ and ‘called out’, then came the knock-out punch: her ex-best-friend, Natalie Beach, wrote an article for The Cut, titled ‘I Was Caroline Calloway’, in which she alleged that it was Natalie who was essentially the brains and ghostwriter of the whole Instagram captions/first book, and Caroline who was a liar, a manipulator, and – perhaps the greatest crime of all – a bad friend. That piece exploded. It was everywhere. The hate being chucked Calloway’s way was immense. Then, in the midst of this, the body of Calloway’s father, who had died by suicide, was found. 

After that, Calloway leant into the ‘scammer’ label, going full chaos online and IRL. She started selling her own facial oil, called Snake Oil. She got two fancy cats and kept being photographed taking them out to parties in tote bags. She started an OnlyFans in which she sold “cerebral softcore porn”, AKA pictures of herself partially nude, partially dressed up as fiction characters. She got accused of not paying her rent, while posting photos painting the floorboards of her apartment white. She went on controversial podcasts. 

All the while, she promised that a book would be coming. Calloway revealed more of her side of the story online, describing in painful detail her relationship with her father, her experience of addiction, her mental illness, her departure from New York. She sold stickers, ‘grift cards’, ‘Caro card readings’. 

Eventually, she announced that yes, a book really was happening, even if few people believed her. That book turned out to be Scammer, Calloway’s first memoir, self-published and sold for pre-order of a ‘luxury first edition’ on her website, for the grand price of $65. 

When I saw this news, I thought something along the lines of: I would actually like to read this, but no way am I sending someone $65 for a book that may not even be real. Then, in May, Calloway posted a story to her Instagram. “If you write about pop culture for any of these publications,” she wrote, in all caps, “DM me and I will give you a luxury first edition of Scammer to review.” One of the publications she @-ed: Stylist. 

I messaged her, we exchanged texts scattered with emoji of teal hearts, fairies, and butterflies, and I handed over my address, still not really believing any book would actually arrive, even as Calloway posted about sending journalists tiny mason jars and hand-made felt flowers. 

Then, on Tuesday 20 June, I arrived home to find a teal package, covered in stickers, in my hallway. Inside, a copy of Scammer, a hand-written note, a felt flower, even the mason jar. I sat down and read the whole thing in one evening, stopping only to make dinner. 

Here are a bunch of thoughts I had while reading. 

1. Well, that’s a lovely card in the front. 

2. I can feel that the marbled paper in the cover has been glued by hand, and I actually find it quite charming. 

3. “Published by Dead Dad Press” is sad and funny, and makes me like Caroline Calloway quite a bit immediately. 

4. Dedicating an entire book to Lena Dunham? Interesting. Later on in the book, Calloway reveals she’s never actually met Dunham. 

5. Excellent epigram. 

6. Excellent opening line. 

7. God, she really is a great writer. The imagery, the description. It’s genuinely gorgeous. I don’t know why I find this surprising… probably because of our cultural view of influencers as superficial and not genuinely talented?

8. The bit about avoiding actually writing a book because of the difficulty of tolerating your own mediocrity… genuinely painful to read this while procrastinating on writing my own book due to overwhelming self-doubt and the belief that I am just quite shit.

9. I can relate to the sense that mental illness is lurking around the corner and that you are doomed to a tragic ending. I can not relate to the certainty of becoming a famous memoirist.

10. I actually feel claustrophobic reading about Calloway growing up with a hoarding father, which again shows just how great of a writer she is. “A tyranny of tchotckes!” Genius. 

11. The revelation that she lied on her application to Cambridge is astounding but also… not really. Of course she did. It’s just surprising to learn that Calloway’s manufacturing of her own narrative started so early on, that what the world would later describe as ‘scamming’ extended to forging grades. 

12. There’s a lot of interesting stuff in here about the distinction between lying, scamming, and falseness versus being an active creator of your identity and life’s path. If you have such a set vision of who you want to be, is it problematic to play with un-truth and deceit to fit into that frame? 

13. If this book were a Taylor Swift lyric, it would probably be: “No one wanted to play with me as a little kid; so I’ve been scheming like a criminal ever since; to make them love me and make it seem effortless; this is the first time I’ve felt the need to confess”. I hope Calloway takes this as the compliment it is intended.

14. I didn’t expect so much queerness in Scammer, and I love that there’s so much of it. I love what Calloway writes about being bisexual; feeling like doing the work of adjusting her identity is too hard, that the “autopilot” of just getting with men is easier, and that often it’s less about being attracted to men, but the power of knowing that men are attracted to you. 

15. I’m sad that Caroline Calloway has had so much rubbish sex. 

16. Wait… am I actually more a Caroline Calloway than a Natalie Beach? Inability to finish major projects of importance, check. Severe mental illness, check. Unhealthy coping mechanisms, check. Desperately wanting women to like me, check.

17. Oh, this is a total reevaluation of the Caroline/Natalie dynamic. I related to Natalie because I thought she was the dowdier friend enraptured by a cooler, more sparkly one. But now it turns out Caroline was obsessed with Natalie. That she had a complicated crush. That she put in so much effort to make Natalie like her back. 

18. This whole thing is Sapphic and obsessive, which is not just very much my vibe but also deeply enjoyable to read. 

19. There’s a really interesting dichotomy here, where Caroline so clearly wants to be liked and be seen as talented and cool and lovable, but also seems to not care at all how she’s perceived. She keeps in some details that do not cast her as remotely likeable – the description of a dream about slitting Natalie’s throat with an arrow, the part where she asks her old professor who’s a better writer and actually publishes that he says she was always the best, definitely the moment she gets a guy to act out parts of Natalie’s assault.

20. On a similar note, there’s this shift back and forth between self-doubt/self-deprecation and total belief. “I can write so fucking well,” writes Caroline. 

21. If you buy this book, you’re really locking yourself in to buying all of Caroline’s future books. She mentions this frequently, noting that parts of her story have to be saved for AND WE WERE LIKE and promising to reveal further details at a later point. 

22. The chunks about addiction are brutal, but also unexpectedly very funny. The details about her doctor dealer are hilarious. Again, incredible writing! She’s good at this!

23. Huge fan of the story about how she got a book agent. The balls. 

24. Again, I am really sponging up the stress of agreeing to do something and knowing you’re just not going to be able to. It’s claustrophobia again, the way the walls are starting to close in. 

25. Caroline Calloway is very smart, and if you need evidence of this, just read the parts of Scammer where she discusses the strategy behind not paying her rent (a small price to pay to live material for her book), leaning into the scammer identity, getting press coverage, and navigating controversy. 

26. She acknowledges the urge to correct the record, advises against doing that, but you can absolutely feel that itch when it comes to telling her own version of everything Natalie wrote in her piece for The Cut. Hey, do what Caroline says, not what she does, is the message. 

27. I can’t fully picture Margaret Qualley playing Caroline Calloway (maybe because she’s not blonde?), but I’m intrigued by Caroline’s view that she’s the perfect fit. Emma Roberts is an interesting recommendation too. 

28. The writing about Caroline’s dad and his death is so powerful and devastating. 

29. I can relate to so much of Caroline’s descriptions of mental illness and the creep towards destruction. Maybe I’ll write another article, titled ‘no, *I’m* Caroline Calloway’. 

30. Genuine thank you to Caroline for including a chapter on writing advice from her old professor. It’s great stuff. 

31. “Over my fucking dead goddamn body would Natalie put out a book before I did.” Ha. 

32. It brings me joy that this book has a happy-ish ending/redemption arc, with Caroline making amends, paying back funds, and doing some healing. 

33. Also, “I’ve made a promise to myself to start dating more women. I don’t want to be rattling around inside my shrunken and shriveled body someday wishing I hadn’t only ever dated men because it was the path of least resistance.” Yes! Good for her. 

34. And lovely final lines that are a truly important, valuable message about ditching shame. 

35. I love a hefty acknowledgements section. 

36. And I really love a note about the typeface. 

37. Caroline Calloway has smashed it. Her first book is, at the risk of being hyperbolic, a masterpiece. The writing is incredible, the narrative delicious. 

38. Do I think you should pay $65 for the first edition, however? Perhaps not. To many people, Caroline has proven herself by writing this real, actual, in-existence book, but to many, she hasn’t totally eradicated her reputation for not being entirely trustworthy. Sending someone you don’t entirely trust a not-small amount of money for something you’re not convinced will arrive sounds a bit stressful. What I would recommend, however, is rounding up a couple of your friends from the disparate Caroline Calloway camps, chipping in a more manageable portion of the cost, then sharing around this memoir like the delectable treat it is. I very much hope it gets snapped up by a bigger publisher and sold in proper bookshops so more people can enjoy Scammer as much as I did. 

Images: Getty; Ellen Scott