CATCH ME IF YOU CAN SUMMARY

Frank W. Abagnale Jr. is only sixteen years old when his parents separate. His mom had moved
out, but Frank decided to stay with his father. His father was still determined to get his wife
back, even though he worked constantly. Frank's father had given him a car to take care of
himself. Frank decided to ask his father for his credit card to work on his car. His father allows it,
but does not know that Frank has racked up $3,400 on his card from the car and girls he has
taken out. His father finds out and forgives him, but his mother does not as easily. She blames
her son's problems on his father and sends him to a Catholic private school for boys. Frank's
mother allowed his to live with his father again and year after, but Frank, seeing how poor his
father now was, decided to leave home at sixteen to make something of himself.

Young Frank was not making enough money as a teenager. He decided to change his age, and
aged ten years over night. He decided to become a pilot. He traveled to New York, Los Angeles,
Boston, and Miami throughout his “career” as a pilot. He traveled to New Orleans, but was taken
in to question if he really worked for Pan Am. He argued with the cops at the Dade County
Sherriff’s Department to state his loyalty and got off free. Abagnale took the close call as a
warning and left to Atlanta, Georgia. When he arrived, he moved into an apartment complex
stating he was a pediatrician. Another pediatrician moved into the building and offered him a job
at a local hospital. He took it, but soon quit at the risk of causing someone to die due to his
inability to be a doctor.

He moved to a different southern city and became a lawyer. He took the bar exam three times,
and practiced law illegally. After being a lawyer, he left and went to Eureka, California. He
stated he was a “vacationing pilot” and cashed a bad check. He called the same bank back later
on and found out that the cops had discovered the fake check and left. His travels took him to
San Francisco where he met a lovely woman by the name of Rosalie. They spent every moment
together and Abagnale had found himself falling in love. They talked about marriage, but his
criminal life kept him from marrying. He decided to tell Rosalie the truth. When he did, she went
home. When he arrived later that evening, the cops had shown up so Frank left. He went to Las
Vegas after that.

While there he met another woman named Pixie. He never entered into a relationship with her.
Instead she helped him without knowing it by giving him the names of supplies he would need to
make checks. She worked for a company that produced them and talked heavily about her job.
Frank went to buy these supplies and started making his own checks. After Vegas, her left and
went to Paris. In Paris, he fell in love with a woman named Monique. She was like Rosalie, but
way more understanding. He instantly became part of her family. Her father was the owner of a
printing press and Frank took advantage of this opportunity. He asked Monique’s father to print
checks “for Pan Am” when really they were for him. Once the job was done, Frank told Monique
he had to go back to work and left for Arizona.

While in Arizona, Frank knew he needed a crew to drive suspicion off of him for cashing these
bad checks. He gathered a group of girls from the University of Arizona. He allowed them to be
“stewardesses” so he could go in and cash checks without being questioned. They traveled to
London, Paris, Rome, Athens, Geneva, Munich, Berlin, Madrid, Oslo, Copenhagen, and Vienna
taking pictures “for the image of Pan Am” and cashing fake checks. After all the girls left, he
stayed in France and went to Montpellier to visit his mother’s family. While there touring the
country, he was caught by the French police. He was arrested and put into Perpignan Prison.

While there, he stayed in what seemed to be a dark cave without any clothes, a bed, and proper
plumbing. He had to use a bucket that would overflow so he would lay in his own filth. They fed
him bread, soup, water, and coffee. The guards messed with him all the time by screwing up his
mental calendar and by giving him mattresses only to take them away. He lost significant weight
and started to lose his mind. After six months, he was transferred to Malmo. There he was treated
for his sicknesses and cleaned up. He was expecting to have to be extradited in other European
countries, but his passport was now void and could go back to the states.

He boarded a flight to New York and was watched by the pilots. Timing it perfectly, just after
the plane landed, he went into the bathroom, broke a latch, and escaped. He was caught in
Montreal not much later and brought to Fulton, Georgia to wait trial. He called on a friend to set
up an elaborate plan. The officers on duty thought he was undercover to observe their treatment
of prisoners. He used that to his advantage by saying he was meeting his boss and left the jail.
The police had tracked him down once again, but he walked out of the building pretending to be
an FBI agent, and left without any of the cops seeing him.

OVERALL ANALYSIS
I thought that this book was going to be packed full of adventure and that it was going to be a
constant run from the cops. I enjoyed reading the book very much, but it was a little repetitive.
All the author seemed to talk about was women and faking checks. The book was very
informative on the author’s life. The title of the book gives an exact idea to what the books is
about, a man faking checks, flying around the world, and running away from the FBI. This book
was a little difficult to read because the author does use some outdated terms as well as airplane
and check vocabulary. He tends to go into depth with some of the ideas presented in the book
that may not be known to many people. My first impression changed a little bit because I was
expecting the book to be really action packed and not as repetitive.

            This book would be considered a nonfiction prose because it tells the true story of Frank
Abagnale Jr. and how he conned the world out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. The character
is the book, Frank Abagnale Jr. The general idea that I received from the book was that the
author was affected by his parents’ divorce and his dad losing all his money. I believe that his
dad losing his money set a predecessor for the author to go through with his scams to make
money and not to be like his father. The setting of this book varies in so many different places
since his flies to other cities and countries. The main settings would have to be Los Angeles,
New York, and France. Those were the main cities in which the author’s scams took place or he
was arrested. The time frame during which the book took place would be in the 1950s. Another
literary technique used in this book was point of view. The point of view would be first-person
because Frank is telling his story of when he was a sixteen year old and how he almost became a
millionaire before the age of twenty-one. The style and language of the book is current for the
1950s. The author calls women and himself foxes. Women in the sense of beauty and himself
because he was being hunted. He refers to the FBI as hounds because of them hunting him.

            The book has been enhanced by seeing the movie. The movie was a great film filled with
action. I judged the book mainly on what I read. There wasn’t anything else for me to judge the
book off of. I have seen the movie, but that was a while ago. I agree with some of the aspects in
this book. The author at one point tried to tell the love of his life that he was a fraud. I believe he
did the right thing, but I disagree with his criminal activity. I think he would have been better off
going to college and making something of himself right after high school. My enjoyment
decreased a little just because of the repetitiveness. I would recommend this book to anyone
interested in the story, but not to people who are slow readers or who hate to read.

            The work did seem very vivid and alive because the author gave so much feeling and
detail into his biography. Knowledge of what the author went through does enhance the way I
feel about this book and how I felt reading it. The book represents the period in which it was set
because of the lack of security. In the world we live in now, no one could pass through the
airport or fake checks as easily as the author did. He made it look like a piece of cake and that
was due to the lack of security in the 1950s in America.

ANALYZING FRANK ABAGNALE JR.

The main character in this book was Frank W. Abagnale Jr. Overall he’s fearful, but very
confident. His best characteristic would be confidence. I know he has confidence because he has
the guts to go out and scam all of these banks and hotels. Even though it’s confidence for a
horrible job, it is still confidence. “Whenever I felt lonely, depressed, rejected or doubtful of my
own worth, I’d dress up in my pilot’s uniform and seek out a crowd. The uniform bought me
respect and dignity. With it on, during such times, I felt like wearing Fortunatus’ cap and
walking in seven league boots. (PG 46)” Even though it was the uniform that mainly gave it to
him, the author still had confidence. If he did not, he would not have faked being a pilot, teacher,
doctor, and lawyer as well as conning several banks and hotels out of money. This trait causes
Frank to have strained relationships with everyone around him as well as getting him into trouble
at the same time. He cannot love or see his family because he has the confidence to go about
conning all these establishments. He gets into trouble with the law due to his confidence. His
over-confidence is what causes him to continue his criminal activity and ultimately what gets
him caught. Frank W. Abagnale Jr. was a fearful but confident man. He went through so many
cities and countries conning banks, hotels, and even women, and never looked over his shoulder.

THEME ANALYSIS
Confidence is a trait worth having, but over-confidence is where trouble occurs. This idea is
present throughout the entire book because the author tells the reader that he should have second
guessed himself and stayed in one place instead of traveling to different places. “I headed west to
California. There was a storm building in the Sierras when I crossed the mountains, but it was
nothing compared to the whirlwind of crime I was soon to create myself. (PG 115)” The author
is explaining that his decisions should have been made more carefully but he was confident in
himself and that he would not get caught if he kept moving. “Montpellier. That was my safe
haven, I finally decided. And having made the decision, I didn’t give it a second thought. I
should have. (PG 214)” The other idea was that if he settled down the FBI would not find him as
easily. In some cases, this worked, but staying in one place caused him to get caught and go to
jail. He became confident and comfortable and thought he could stay. Confidence is a great trait
to have, but over-confidence is where trouble begins. If Frank Abagnale Jr. had played it safe, he
would not have gotten caught, at least not as easily. Over-confidence causes people to make
stupid decisions.

Catch Me If You Can Summary and Study Guide

SuperSummary, a modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, offers high-quality study guides
for challenging works of literature. This 39-page guide for “Catch Me If You Can” by Frank Abagnale
includes detailed chapter summaries and analysis covering 10 chapters, as well as several more in-
depth sections of expert-written literary analysis. Featured content includes commentary on major
characters, 25 important quotes, essay topics, and key themes like Social Scripts and Performance
and Gender Privilege and the Use of Women.
Plot Summary
Catch Me If You Can: The True Story of a Real Fake is a nonfiction book written from the
perspective of Frank Abagnale, a famous conartist and check-forger. Though styled as an
autobiography, the book was co-written by Abagnale and author Stan Redding. Originally
published in 1980, Catch Me If You Can was popularized by a 2002 film directed by Steven
Spielberg and starring Leonardo DiCaprio. The book also inspired a Broadway musical of the
same name.
Much of Catch Me If You Can revolves around Abagnale’s experience as a con artist from 1964 to
1969. Between the ages of sixteen and twenty-one, the world-wise Abagnale dons a wide
variety of professional disguises and assumes jobs accordingly. These professions include
copilot, doctor, lawyer, sociology professor, FBI agent, and U.S. Bureau of Prisons agent.
Through the cashing of over $2.5 million in forged checks, Abagnale is able to finance a
luxurious lifestyle, purchasing fine suits, expensive cars, and traveling around the world. During
his travels, he pursues relationships with a number of women, many of whom work in the
airline industry and unconsciously abet Abagnale’s crimes.
Abagnale cites his parents’ divorce as a major impetus for his criminal evolution. Hoping to win
back Abagnale’s mother, his father coaches him in the art of delivering speeches and gifts,
unwittingly teaching him how to be a con man. Abagnale runs away to New York, beginning his
criminal career out of a need to survive. His mature appearance allows him to cash a number of
fake checks from bank accounts with no money in them. When the fake checks begin to add up,
Abagnale realizes he can no longer stay in New York.

Inspired by their stylish uniforms and aura of accomplishment, Abagnale assumes the identity
of a Pan Am copilot. After creating a fake pilot license and researching at the airport, he poses
as a copilot deadheading (flying in the cockpit between different employment destinations free
of charge)to business destinations. This scheme allows him to fly anywhere for free. In every
city he visits, he obtains money by cashing fake checks. While pretending to be a pilot, he
makes both friends and girlfriends. Most of the time, he stays in a city for only a few days.

Tired of constant travel, Abagnale moves into a luxury apartment outside of Atlanta. To avoid
questions from the landlord, he assumes the identity of a doctor. A neighbor who is a real
doctor invites Abagnale to take a position as a supervising resident in the local hospital. After
this position ends, Abagnale jumps from town to town, assuming the identity of a Harvard-
educated lawyer and a Columbia-educated sociology professor.

Both to ease his restlessness and to stay away from the FBI, Abagnale decides to reassume his
pilot identity and go to Europe. He creates a fake flight crew to make his operation appear more
legitimate. He learns that Pan Am recruits flight crews at the University of Arizona, and he
recruits his own crew for a faux PR campaign for Pan Am. He flies around Europe, cashing fake
checks while young women pose for photos in uniform.

Abagnale again grows weary of his constant movement and decides to settle in rural France.
There, he is apprehended and imprisoned by French police. French prison conditions are harsh
and inhumane. Next, he is extradited to Sweden, where prisoners are treated with care and
dignity. He is then sent to prison in the United States. While in the U.S., he manages to escape
police custody two times: once from a taxiing airliner, and once from a U.S. federal penitentiary.

After serving four years in a prison, it is difficult for Frank to find a job. He decides to capitalize
on his criminal talents and reputation and get work fighting crime. Frank obtains a job as an
American security consultant, and remains considered one of the country’s leading experts on
financial foul play.
 Structuring the book review
Most book reviews are between 100-500 words, though an academic
review may go up to 1500. Check with the lecturer if you are not sure
how long your book review should be.
At the start, put the complete bibliographic information:
Title in full, author, place of publication, publisher, date of publication
edition, number of pages.
A published review will usually include price and ISBN number and your
lecturer may require you to do this too.

Your introduction will usually include:

 your overall impression of the book

 a statement about the author

 a statement on the purpose of the book

 a statement of the significance of the work

 a comment about the relationship between this work and others by the same author, the same subject and

the same genre

The body of your review develops the points you want to make:

 greater detail on the author's thesis and a summary of the main points

 evaluation of strengths, weaknesses, contribution or bias

 the evidence that is the basis of your critique

The conclusion (last paragraph) includes:

 your final assessment

 restatement of overall impression

 (re)statement of your recommendation

No new information should be included in the conclusion.
Reference list: this is put at the end as usual, using the referencing style
requested by the lecturer.