I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer


Michelle McNamara - 2018
    Then he disappeared, eluding capture by multiple police forces and some of the best detectives in the area.Three decades later, Michelle McNamara, a true crime journalist who created the popular website TrueCrimeDiary.com, was determined to find the violent psychopath she called "the Golden State Killer." Michelle pored over police reports, interviewed victims, and embedded herself in the online communities that were as obsessed with the case as she was.At the time of the crimes, the Golden State Killer was between the ages of eighteen and thirty, Caucasian, and athletic—capable of vaulting tall fences. He always wore a mask. After choosing a victim—he favored suburban couples—he often entered their home when no one was there, studying family pictures, mastering the layout. He attacked while they slept, using a flashlight to awaken and blind them. Though they could not recognize him, his victims recalled his voice: a guttural whisper through clenched teeth, abrupt and threatening.I’ll Be Gone in the Dark—the masterpiece McNamara was writing at the time of her sudden death—offers an atmospheric snapshot of a moment in American history and a chilling account of a criminal mastermind and the wreckage he left behind. It is also a portrait of a woman’s obsession and her unflagging pursuit of the truth. Framed by an introduction by Gillian Flynn and an afterword by her husband, Patton Oswalt, the book was completed by Michelle’s lead researcher and a close colleague. Utterly original and compelling, it is destined to become a true crime classic—and may at last unmask the Golden State Killer.

Till Death Do Us Part


J.J. Slate - 2015
    Spousal murder is never acceptable, but newlywed murder seems to be on a completely different level. It is unconscionable to think someone could stand in front of his family and friends, pledging to honor and cherish another person for the rest of his life, and then kill his spouse in cold blood just months, weeks, or even days later. It happens more than you'd think--and, contrary to popular belief, it's not always the husband who acts as the aggressor. In her third true crime book, bestselling author JJ Slate examines more than twenty true stories of newlywed murders, delving into the past of the victims and aggressors, searching for answers to the question everyone is asking: How does this sort of thing happen? These shocking cases of betrayal and murder might just make you think differently about those five sacred words, "till death do us part."

Reel to Real: The Video Store Murders


Joyce Nance - 2014
    But in March 1996, the robbery of a Hollywood Video store went horribly wrong, ending in a hail of gunfire and the worst mass murder in the history of Albuquerque, New Mexico. This book is based on the true story of three ex-cons who met through the New Mexico Community Corrections early release program. One was obsessed with movies and guns, another was hopelessly in love, and the third double-crossed them both. Initially, all hoped for a new and better life, but in this modern tragedy, the ex-cons' self-destructive impulses ultimately led to their doom and that of their innocent victims. An entire city was left to mourn.

Profiles in Murder: An FBI Legend Dissects Killers and Their Crimes


Russell Vorpagel - 1998
    Was her killer a raging psychotic, or as timid as she was?In a charred house a partially clothed woman is found in her bed with a pornographic magazine and a mirror. Did she die in the fire -- or at a sex killer's hands?Before it was immortalized in The Silence of the Lambs, the FBI Behavioral Science Profiling Unit was pioneered by Russell Vorpagel. Now the legendary profiler takes you into the most intriguing cases of his career -- actual cases of serial killings, sex crimes, celebrity murders, and hostage takings. Showing how profiling turns the chaos and blood of a crime scene into a psychological snapshot of a suspect -- his age, his personality, even the model car he drives -- Vorpagel illuminates the twisted minds of the most vicious criminals of our time. From the vampire murderer Richard Trenton Case -- who consumed the blood of his victims -- to Vorpagel's own duel with an assassin on the island of St. Croix, Profiles in Murder is the chilling real-life story of the human monsters who share our streets -- and the men and women who hunt them down.

True Crime: Chilling Investigations Of Some Of Our Histories Most Unfamiliar True Crime Stories


Travis S. Kennedy - 2015
    When a crime has been committed, it is essential for the perpetrator to be punished. In that way, although the family of the victims won’t always be able to make sense of what happened, they will still understand that nobody is above the law. Publicizing the criminal’s modus operandi is sometimes good - the citizens will be well aware of their tactics and they can take better care of themselves. On the other hand, it can also be bad, because “would be” criminals and serial killers are also watching and they might like the idea. Such was the case of Eddie Seda. Other than him, 4 others wreaked havoc in different places, at various times: There was the man who killed prostitutes in his own home (with his family in it), a man who claimed to have killed 600 hundred women when only 3 victims were verified, a father who brought his son to “hunt” some humans, and a husband who killed his wife when she learned of his lies. How did they do it? And how did the law authorities catch them? Here Is A Preview Of What You'll Learn... True Crime – What Drives a Killer to the Edge? True Crime – A Day of Hunting in Leonia True Crime – Kendall and His House of Horrors True Crime – Try Harder: 2nd Zodiac True Crime – The Prankster Killer True Crime – Lori's Husband Much, much more!

Un-Making a Murderer: The Framing of Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey


Shaun Attwood - 2017
    Sometimes mistakes are made. But even more terrifying is when the authorities conspire to frame them. That's what happened to Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey, who were convicted of murder and are serving life sentences.Un-Making a Murderer is an explosive book which uncovers the illegal, devious and covert tactics used by Wisconsin officials, including: Concealing Other SuspectsPaying Expert Witnesses to LiePlanting EvidenceJury TamperingThe art of framing innocent people has been in practice for centuries and will continue until the perpetrators are held accountable; turning conventional assumptions and beliefs in the justice system upside down, Un-Making a Murderer takes you on that journey.The profits from this book are going to Steven and Brendan and to donate free books to schools and prisons. In the last two years, Shaun Attwood has donated 15,000 books.

Cellar of Horror: The Story of Gary Heidnik


Ken Englade - 1989
    What police found there was an incredible nightmare made real. Four young women had been held captive--some for four months--half-naked and chained. They had been tortured, starved, and repeatedly raped. But more grotesque discoveries lay in the kitchen: human limbs frozen, a torso burned to cinders, an empty pot suspiciously scorched...This is not a story for the faint-hearted. Cellar of Horror is a shocking true account of the self-proclaimed minister with a long history of mental illness, who preyed upon the susceptible and the retarded in a bizarre plan to create his own "baby factory." It is a macabre web spun around money, power, and religion, tangled with courtroom drama and lawyers' tactics, sure to send a chill into your very soul.

Every Move You Make


M. William Phelps - 2005
    Evans, a career criminal, master of disguise, prolific thief, and serial killer.

The CEO


Peter Ralph - 2007
     He was forty-five and time was running out when fate dealt him an unexpected opportunity. The company was old, staid and well-respected but it was under performing and Aspine was determined to turn it around no matter who he had to crush. Soon he was at war with the company's employees, unions, suppliers, financiers and co-directors but nothing was going to stop him. Not his chairman, not his wife, not his mistress, not the anonymous death threats and definitely not the press. Aspine could almost taste the glory, the riches and peer recognition he'd craved for so long. He knew he had countless detractors and enemies who he contemptuously labelled "losers"and paid no heed to. Would this prove to be a miscalculation of monumental proportions or would he prevail?

Serial Killers (True Crime Series)


Laura Foreman - 1992
    Probes the killer resentments and sinister fantasies, and find out what drove these apparently ordinary people to commit acts of savagery.

The Michigan Murders


Edward Keyes - 1976
    One month later, her naked body—stabbed over thirty times and missing both feet and a forearm—was discovered, partially buried, on an abandoned farm. A year later, the body of twenty-year-old Joan Schell was found, similarly violated. Southeastern Michigan was terrorized by something it had never experienced before: a serial killer. Over the next two years, five more bodies were uncovered around Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti, Michigan. All the victims were tortured and mutilated. All were female students.   After multiple failed investigations, a chance sighting finally led to a suspect. On the surface, John Norman Collins was an all-American boy—a fraternity member studying elementary education at Eastern Michigan University. But Collins wasn’t all that he seemed. His female friends described him as aggressive and short tempered. And in August 1970, Collins, the “Ypsilanti Ripper,” was arrested, found guilty, and sentenced to life in prison without chance of parole.   Written by the coauthor of The French Connection, The Michigan Murders delivers a harrowing depiction of the savage murders that tormented a small midwestern town.

Blind Faith


Joe McGinniss - 1989
    Rob Marshall was the big breadwinner, king of the country club set. Maria Marshall was his stunningly beautiful wife and the perfect mom to their three great kids. Then one night Rob, his head bloodied, reported Maria had been brutally slain. Sympathy poured in - until disquieting facts began to surface...and the true story of adultery, gambling, drugs and murder tore the mask off Rob Marshall and the blinders off the town that thought he could do no wrong...

Witch Hunt


S.M. Reine - 2014
    Yeah, maybe he brought the waitress home for some fun — he was too drunk to remember it — but he knows for a fact that he didn’t kill her. He’s an agent with the Office of Preternatural Affairs. He doesn’t hurt people. He saves them.The cops disagree. Now Cèsar is running.The search for a shaman.Isobel Stonecrow speaks with the dead…for the right price. She brings closure to the bereaved and heals broken hearts. But when she resurrects someone for the wrong client, she ends up on the OPA’s most wanted list.One risky solution.Tracking down Isobel is the last case assigned to Cèsar before he bolts. If he finds her, he can prove that he didn’t kill that waitress. He can clear his name, get his job back, and bring justice to the victim.She’s just one witch. Cèsar has bagged a dozen witches before.How hard can one more be?

She's Not There


Marla Madison - 2011
    . . Is the rising number of abused women who've gone missing a statistical anomaly? Or is a serial killer targeting this vulnerable group of women? When the Milwaukee Police Department refuses to investigate because no bodies have been discovered, Lisa Rayburn, the clinical psychologist who discovers the anomaly, is drawn into an investigation to discover the cause after one of her own clients goes missing. She finds herself forming an unlikely alliance with a former policewoman turned security consultant, TJ Peacock, and the husbands of two of the missing women who may themselves be murderers. When TJ is attacked, and a woman looking remarkably like Lisa is found murdered, they know . . . someone is willing to kill to protect his secret. Can they reveal the killer before he gets to them?

H.H. Holmes: The True History of the White City Devil


Adam Selzer - 2017
    It reveals not only the true story but how the legend evolved, taking advantage of hundreds of primary sources that have never been examined before, including legal documents, letters, articles, and records that have been buried in archives for more than a century. Although Holmes is just as famous now as he was in 1895, this deep analysis of contemporary materials makes clear how much of the previously known story came from reporters who were nowhere near the action, a dangerously unqualified new police chief, and lies invented by Holmes himself.