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The Set Up
Ally, an aspiring actress, is about to give up on getting her big break. But then, after another disappointing audition, a charismatic scene partner says he has a fun gig for her. Soon, Ally is making easy money working for a guerrilla-marketing outfit called The Set Up. Now she's getting lots of practice pretending to be someone she's not-but each job seems more suspicious than the last.
Marshall is a washed-up journalist, teaching a summer class at the university and struggling to keep his students (and himself) focused on his planned lessons. Someone has been leaving copies of his old articles on his lectern every morning, forcing him to revisit the story of a decades-old tragedy and mistakes he's made … both personal and professional.
Web, a quirky loner, has always been ready to pick up and go at a moment's notice. In fact, he's very good at not being noticed, at least not unless he wants to be. That's been helpful in his years working for the Set Up, but the new hire's questions are starting to make Web feel less confident about his work as a con man.
What is the Set Up, and who's playing whom? The search for answers leads Ally, Web, and Marshall from the glitz of the Strip to the grit of Sin City's strip-mall suburbs, and from an abandoned Unification compound to a deadly bar mitzvah. As their paths converge, this unlikely trio uncover the shadowy power dynamics and shifting personalities that shape a city.
Marshall is a washed-up journalist, teaching a summer class at the university and struggling to keep his students (and himself) focused on his planned lessons. Someone has been leaving copies of his old articles on his lectern every morning, forcing him to revisit the story of a decades-old tragedy and mistakes he's made … both personal and professional.
Web, a quirky loner, has always been ready to pick up and go at a moment's notice. In fact, he's very good at not being noticed, at least not unless he wants to be. That's been helpful in his years working for the Set Up, but the new hire's questions are starting to make Web feel less confident about his work as a con man.
What is the Set Up, and who's playing whom? The search for answers leads Ally, Web, and Marshall from the glitz of the Strip to the grit of Sin City's strip-mall suburbs, and from an abandoned Unification compound to a deadly bar mitzvah. As their paths converge, this unlikely trio uncover the shadowy power dynamics and shifting personalities that shape a city.
320 pages, Paperback
Published May 20, 2025
30 people want to read
About the author
Jonathan R. Wynn
5 books12 followersJonathan Wynn is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He works at the intersection of urban and cultural sociology.
Bluesky: @jonwynn.bsky.social
Twitter: @wynnsociology
His major publications include Music/City: American Festivals and Placemaking in Austin, Nashville, and Newport, The Tour Guide: Walking and Talking New York, The City and the Hospital: The Paradox of Medically Overserved Communities, and his sociological thriller, The Set Up. The Set Up is a ‘Most Anticipated Book of 2025’ by the Chicago Review of Books.
The Contexts magazine review of his work to date, “Jonathan Wynn, Sociological Detective” provides a surprising–both in its existence and in its insight–overview of the connections between his sociological and fiction writing:
“[I]f there is a common thread across Wynn’s books, it is this: Sociologists do well to find their concepts in use in the world—among the expert practitioners of daily life. This is not just an interpretive point, but a methodological one. Wynn’s work suggests that some of the most durable insights of our discipline emerge when we sociologists recognize that people are already doing the work we claim to analyze—and often with more skill, nuance, and improvisational awareness than we might otherwise give them credit for. […] In some of its classic forms, a good detective story does not uncover hidden facts so much as piece together the answer that was always already there. The joy of the reading lies in your discovery of what you had passed over or ignored—what was obscured by any number of other possible answers. Sociology, in Wynn’s view, seems to work the same way. It gets us to attend to what has been happening all along—whether in the hospital parking lot and cafeteria, the distribution of music venues across a street grid, or the mystery and surprise that lurk around every corner.”
His work has also been published in City & Community, Media, Culture & Society, Sociological Theory, Qualitative Sociology, Sociological Forum, Socius, Contexts, and Ethnography. He was the co-editor of the ASA Culture Section Newsletter (2011-2014), a 2017 Public Engagement Project Fellow. He was co-chair for the UMass Amherst Common Read committee (2014-2016), an advisory board member for the Penguin/Random House First Year Experience, supports the UMass Amherst Emerging Scholars program, wrote for the Everyday Sociology blog (2011-2024), and is on the Editorial Board for the University of Massachusetts Press starting Fall 2025.
Bluesky: @jonwynn.bsky.social
Twitter: @wynnsociology
His major publications include Music/City: American Festivals and Placemaking in Austin, Nashville, and Newport, The Tour Guide: Walking and Talking New York, The City and the Hospital: The Paradox of Medically Overserved Communities, and his sociological thriller, The Set Up. The Set Up is a ‘Most Anticipated Book of 2025’ by the Chicago Review of Books.
The Contexts magazine review of his work to date, “Jonathan Wynn, Sociological Detective” provides a surprising–both in its existence and in its insight–overview of the connections between his sociological and fiction writing:
“[I]f there is a common thread across Wynn’s books, it is this: Sociologists do well to find their concepts in use in the world—among the expert practitioners of daily life. This is not just an interpretive point, but a methodological one. Wynn’s work suggests that some of the most durable insights of our discipline emerge when we sociologists recognize that people are already doing the work we claim to analyze—and often with more skill, nuance, and improvisational awareness than we might otherwise give them credit for. […] In some of its classic forms, a good detective story does not uncover hidden facts so much as piece together the answer that was always already there. The joy of the reading lies in your discovery of what you had passed over or ignored—what was obscured by any number of other possible answers. Sociology, in Wynn’s view, seems to work the same way. It gets us to attend to what has been happening all along—whether in the hospital parking lot and cafeteria, the distribution of music venues across a street grid, or the mystery and surprise that lurk around every corner.”
His work has also been published in City & Community, Media, Culture & Society, Sociological Theory, Qualitative Sociology, Sociological Forum, Socius, Contexts, and Ethnography. He was the co-editor of the ASA Culture Section Newsletter (2011-2014), a 2017 Public Engagement Project Fellow. He was co-chair for the UMass Amherst Common Read committee (2014-2016), an advisory board member for the Penguin/Random House First Year Experience, supports the UMass Amherst Emerging Scholars program, wrote for the Everyday Sociology blog (2011-2024), and is on the Editorial Board for the University of Massachusetts Press starting Fall 2025.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
June 4, 2025
I enjoyed this book so much - from Jon Wynn bringing sociologists like Erving Goffman and WEB Dubois into our world of phone-mediated life, to the super nuanced (in my reading experience, uniquely so) and accurate Las Vegas stories, this was a blast. Just started my summer - and I already have my favorite summer read.
May 31, 2025
This was a great read! It moved at a good clip, the characters felt real, the dialogue was genuine, and I did not see the ending coming! Highly recommend!
June 24, 2025
3.5 rounded down to 3 stars.
Quite an intriguing .. er .. um .. set up 😁 .. for the story, one that hooked me for most of the book.
Ally is an actress, but just can't seem to get a break. However, after she loses out on yet another audition, she is approached by a man who was also at the audition and is asked if she is interested in some gig work. She's interested in the idea and even more interested in the money she can make for each job. They sell it to her as mini acting jobs, sort of like secret shoppers, but in essence she realizes that they are in fact cons or scams, something even beyond the MLM nonsense that her roommate thinks she's gotten involved in.
Parallel to this story about the Set Up, we follow around a college journalism professor, Marshall. He's taken this job after he lost his real journalism job when it seemed that his confidential sources turned on him, showing his story of political graft and misdoings was all full of lies. He's bored with teaching until someone starts leaving copies of his old stories from the mid 1990's, and the first one was about the death of a pedestrian who had been a loner. But now that he's taking a second look, could he have missed something back then?
What do these two parallel stories have to unite them? Is there a connection? And what exactly is the Set Up?
I really enjoyed the story when it follow Ally and her cohorts around, and particularly Ally as she was interested to learn more about the organization. I felt like the story got a bit bogged down during the Marshall segments. But overall, this was good and I would definitely recommend this and read another by this author!
Quite an intriguing .. er .. um .. set up 😁 .. for the story, one that hooked me for most of the book.
Ally is an actress, but just can't seem to get a break. However, after she loses out on yet another audition, she is approached by a man who was also at the audition and is asked if she is interested in some gig work. She's interested in the idea and even more interested in the money she can make for each job. They sell it to her as mini acting jobs, sort of like secret shoppers, but in essence she realizes that they are in fact cons or scams, something even beyond the MLM nonsense that her roommate thinks she's gotten involved in.
Parallel to this story about the Set Up, we follow around a college journalism professor, Marshall. He's taken this job after he lost his real journalism job when it seemed that his confidential sources turned on him, showing his story of political graft and misdoings was all full of lies. He's bored with teaching until someone starts leaving copies of his old stories from the mid 1990's, and the first one was about the death of a pedestrian who had been a loner. But now that he's taking a second look, could he have missed something back then?
What do these two parallel stories have to unite them? Is there a connection? And what exactly is the Set Up?
I really enjoyed the story when it follow Ally and her cohorts around, and particularly Ally as she was interested to learn more about the organization. I felt like the story got a bit bogged down during the Marshall segments. But overall, this was good and I would definitely recommend this and read another by this author!
July 25, 2025
I think Mr. Wynn might read this because he's commented on the handful of reviews it's gotten so far, so I just want to tell him I'm sorry in advance.
I read this as a recommendation from my aunt, who brought it on vacation with us. I honestly kind of struggled through it. My review hinges on the idea that I think this book was better before it was written out.
That sounds harsh. Let me phrase it this way: there were a lot of skips in explaining the premise or details in the book that I know Wynn thought through. He just didn't manage to get everything down on the page. We've all been so excited to write or talk that we just yap, regardless of whether someone understands by the end. We skip stuff because we know it like the back of our hand, or we think it's common knowledge.
With such an original and interesting premise, it can't be common knowledge. I wanted to hear every detail Wynn created in his mind. I wish his thoughts were completely transcribed during his writing process. I felt like I missed out on a lot, even though I reread paragraphs to see if there was something I missed because I didn't understand.
I'm kind of sad that I didn't get to fully enjoy the story as I was too busy trying to figure out where some plot points came from. Overall though, I'm glad I spent the time reading it, as it's a refreshingly original piece of work.
I read this as a recommendation from my aunt, who brought it on vacation with us. I honestly kind of struggled through it. My review hinges on the idea that I think this book was better before it was written out.
That sounds harsh. Let me phrase it this way: there were a lot of skips in explaining the premise or details in the book that I know Wynn thought through. He just didn't manage to get everything down on the page. We've all been so excited to write or talk that we just yap, regardless of whether someone understands by the end. We skip stuff because we know it like the back of our hand, or we think it's common knowledge.
With such an original and interesting premise, it can't be common knowledge. I wanted to hear every detail Wynn created in his mind. I wish his thoughts were completely transcribed during his writing process. I felt like I missed out on a lot, even though I reread paragraphs to see if there was something I missed because I didn't understand.
I'm kind of sad that I didn't get to fully enjoy the story as I was too busy trying to figure out where some plot points came from. Overall though, I'm glad I spent the time reading it, as it's a refreshingly original piece of work.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews