Patrick Radden Keefe on a Double Life, a Gilded City and a Mysterious Death

The Next Big Idea

Next Big Idea Club

Education, Social Sciences, Science, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 9 April 2026

⏱️ 61 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 2023, Patrick Radden Keefe met a man who told him, "I might have a story for you." When you're Patrick — New Yorker staff writer, author of "some of the most memorable nonfiction books of the last decade" (that's the New York Times talking) — this is a hazard of the trade. But he heard the guy out. The guy said he knew a family whose 19-year-old son had died in mysterious circumstances. "He went off the balcony of a luxury apartment building overlooking the Thames." When the boy's parents started looking into it, they made an astonishing discovery: Their son — a nice, upper-middle-class Londoner — had been running around the city posing as the son of a Russian oligarch. "This guy said only about that much," Patrick tells us in today's episode, "and I knew if the family would talk to me, this was my next thing." His new book is London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family's Search for Truth. The Next Big Idea is now on YouTube! You can find our episodes ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. Follow Rufus on ⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠, subscribe to our ⁠⁠Substack⁠⁠, or send us an email at ⁠podcast@nextbigideaclub.com⁠. The best way to support the show is by becoming a Next Big Idea Club member. Learn more at ⁠⁠nextbigideaclub.com⁠⁠, and use code PODCAST for a super secret discount (spoiler: it’s 20% off). Sponsored By: Fabric — Join the thousands of parents who trust Fabric to help protect their family at ⁠⁠meetfabric.com/nbi⁠⁠ Factor — Head to ⁠⁠⁠factormeals.com/idea50off⁠⁠⁠ and use code idea50off to get 50% off your first box Granola — Get three months free at ⁠⁠granola.ai/idea⁠⁠ Shopify — Start your $1/month trial at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠shopify.com/nbi⁠⁠⁠

Transcript

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0:00.0	London, November 29th, 2019.
0:03.0	At 223 in the morning, a CCTV camera picks up movement on the fifth floor of a luxury apartment building overlooking the Thames.
0:11.0	The building is dark, asleep, but one apartment, 504, is awash with light.
0:18.0	And on the balcony of that apartment stands a slender figure, a young man.
0:23.0	He moves to one corner and peers down into the rushing river.
0:27.0	He moves to the other corner and pauses.
0:30.2	Then he steps back to the center of the balcony
0:33.4	and jumps.
0:35.0	The next thing the camera captures,
0:37.2	someone inside the apartment turns off the lights.
0:40.3	I'm Caleb Bissinger.
0:43.3	And I'm Rufus Criscombe.
0:45.3	And this is the next big idea.
0:47.3	Today, the mystery of Zach Brettler, a 19-year-old who fell to his death from a luxury apartment that wasn't his, and the parents
0:55.4	who set out to discover what really happened.
0:58.4	They have to do the legwork that the police wouldn't do, and that takes them into this underworld.
1:05.5	And they are having these really chilling moments where they realize there are people in their
1:10.3	own community
1:11.2	who might know more about Zach's death than they're letting on. That's Patrick Radden-Keefe, author
1:18.2	of Say Nothing, and Empire of Pain. The L.A. Times says that a new book by Patrick means
1:24.2	drop everything and close the blinds. And that's certainly true of his latest London Falling published this week.
1:31.3	We spoke about how Zach Brettler ended up on that balcony,
	...

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