Oldest Tricks in the Book

It’s the oldest trick in the book.  You get the punt—you get others so deeply
involved that they don’t dare fold.  It’s the dream, you see?  They think if they stay in it’ll all work out.
—Terry Pratchett, Going Postal (2004)

Hah!  That’s the oldest trick in the book, Skip.  They’re tryin’ to decoy us away from ‘ere so they can burn the wallgate.
—Brian Jacques, Marlfox (1998)

Hah!  That’s the oldest trick in the book, Skip.  They’re tryin’ to decoy us away ere so they can burn the wallgate.
—Brian Jacques, Marlfox (1998)

It’s the oldest trick in the world.  We must cut.
—Gilles Pouliot, Legislative Assembly of Ontario 1995)

Counting sheep: The oldest trick in the book really works.
—James B. Mass, Power Sleep (1999)

Sometimes these guys would be taken into Henry’s confidence (the oldest trick in the world to get people to be on your side, and feel important so they will cooperate).
—Brice Taylor, Thanks for the Memories (1999)

[T]he tire tracks vanished into a river, one of the oldest tricks in the book.
—J. Gregory Keyes, Deadly Relations (1999)

—Fiona Mountain, Pale As the Dead (2004)

I was telling her she was beautiful.  The oldest trick in the world, but it was working!
—Howard Stern, Private Parts (1997)

“The coat change was the oldest trick in the book.”
—Celeste Bradley, The Pretender: The Liar’s Club (2003)

If one is being followed, this trick involves changing one’s coat to a different color so as to lose oneself in a crowd.

The oldest trick in the book happened to him.  He came home early one afternoon and found his wife in bed with another guy.
—Christopher Pike, The Blind Mirror (2003)

—Deke McClelland and Galen Fott, Photoshop Elements for Dummies (2002)

A centrifuge is a plot, a conspiracy, used by devious characters to cover up their devious behavior.  It's one of the oldest tricks in the book.
—John R. Erickson, The Case of the Halloween Ghost (1998)

Brilliant!  A perfect feint!  Call East, Strike West!  Oldest trick in the book!
—Louis Cha and John Minford, The Deer and the Cauldron (2000)

To bombard one sector and attack another was the oldest trick in the game.
—J. G. Farrell, The Singapore Grip (2005)

My informant relaxed, having fallen for the oldest trick in the book—the one about pretending you know more than you do.
—Rosemary Edghill, Bell, Book, and Murder (1994)

[A]t least he didn’t choose blindness, which is the oldest and weakest
 trick in the book.
—Thomas Alton Gardner, Confessions of a Corporate Spy (2004)

—Lorraine Delia Kenny, Daughters of Suburbia (2000)

It’s the oldest trick in the world.  If it’s bad news, blame the messenger.
—Kenneth Davidson, “Howard’s Telstra Trickery,” The Age (2005)

I had fallen for the oldest trick in the book: the Big Three Gambit.  I had been led down the garden path.  I’d had the wool pulled over my eyes.  I had been taken for a ride.  I was the Walrus.
—Joe Queenan, Queenan Country (2004)

Unbeknownst to them, Smith and Mahto had fallen for the oldest trick in the book
by believing their own press.
—Paul VanDevelder, Coyote Warrior (2004)