M.E. Thomas describes herself as a cutthroat attorney who sailed through law school without much effort, landed a position at a prestigious law firm, and then became a professor. She also claims to fantasize about murder, drops friends when their personal problems get in the way of her fun, and plots ways to “ruin people” in her spare time. She straddles a fine line between success and failure, with the traits that have gotten her ahead simultaneously contributing to her periodic downfalls.

M.E. Thomas is a sociopath. And you might be one, too.

In her new book, Confessions of a Sociopath, Thomas, writing under a pseudonym that pokes fun at her narcissism, removes her mask of carefully crafted personality traits in an attempt to prove that sociopathy is not simply a disorder of serial killers but one that exists on a spectrum, plaguing to varying degrees a large portion of successful, apparently well-adjusted people.