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.

In The Attic


Garry Rodgers - 2016
    They failed. He’d been in the attic the entire time.At 3 a.m., on Sunday morning and in the black of night, Billy Ray climbed down. He butchered Maria and her defenseless lover, committing unspeakable desecration to their bodies. Billy Ray aimlessly left the crime scene—a senseless scene sickening to the hardest of investigators—and was caught three days later, still caked with his victims’ blood.Billy Ray confessed, allowing a terrifying yet fascinating access to his psychopathic, anti-social mind—a mind diagnosed as one of the most outstanding cases of mental disorder a team of forensic psychiatrists ever saw. Here’s what readers of In The Attic are saying: “Aghast! This is one of the best written and easily the most horrifying suspense story I have read. The writing is so clear and so compelling that you are immediately drawn in. I. Could. Not. Put. This. Down.” “The author’s seamless POV transitions are genius. You’re given a disquieting look into the deeply disturbed, misogynistic psyche of a killer and the concern of a dedicated, seasoned police officer.” “As events unfolded, I found myself praying the victim would somehow survive, which is absurd, as you know going in, the story is about a double murder. Garry Rodgers’ writing is so fluid, he places you in the detective’s shoes without effort—you’re there, you’re experiencing scenes as they unfold. I’m not prone to nightmares by something I’ve read, but Garry Rodgers has succeeded where others left little, or no impact.” “Do not let the horrific and graphic nature of this novel dissuade you. This is a must-read for crime novel enthusiasts. I felt driven to finish this book in record time. True story, great writing, emotional investment. What more could you want from a title?" "In my opinion, Garry Rodgers is slated to become one of the most outstanding crime writers of our time.” ”If you've ever read The Widow by Fiona Barton or The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins, m

Wicked Intentions: The Sheila LaBarre Murders -- A True Story


Kevin Flynn - 2008
    A series of young men had come and gone from the farm over the years, all seeming to vanish into thin air. Now LaBarre was on the run. Eventually she would be caught and would plead insanity. But was she indeed insane — an "avenging angel sent to kill pedophiles," as she claimed — or a vicious, calculating serial killer? Wicked Intentions explores the case in depth, from investigation to trial. As the Emmy award-winning television reporter who first broke the story of the Sheila LaBarre murders, Kevin Flynn is uniquely positioned to unveil the details of the bizarre chain of events that culminated in one of America's most sensational murder stories — a spellbinding true story of obsession and vigilantism carried to a deadly extreme.

My Father's Son


John Davis - 2015
    Ours were just bigger than others. "My earliest memory is of a gun." That gun was in his father's hand - and it was pointed at his mother's head. John Davis grew up in the 1970s and '80s on the rough streets of Brooklyn, a place where no one thought twice when parents smacked around their kids-or each other. At the center of the tumultuous neighborhood, and John's world, was his larger-than-life father, Roberto. The Argentinean butcher and kingpin drug dealer was a sadistic bully whose mercurial temper left a trail of tears and chaos across his family. John, in particular, seemed to bear the brunt of Roberto's wildly swinging moods. Any wrong word could cause an explosion. Every knock on the door might be one of Roberto's enemies, or the police. In his publishing debut, Davis recounts how he spent his childhood in constant terror and his teen years learning to fight back. But it was much later, as an adult, that he learned the most shocking thing of all about his father, his past, and himself. Told with raw honesty and deep emotion, My Father's Son is a memoir of fear, abuse, survival, and identity.

The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer


Philip Carlo - 2006
    . . if I kill Mommy, if something happens and she dies, I’ll have to kill you all . . .  I can’t leave any witnesses.”“Yes, Daddy.  I know, Daddy,” she said.As strange and horrible a thing as this was to tell a child, Richard was trying to let Merrick know in advance—out of consideration—what might happen.  He wanted her to understand that he was doing such a thing out of . . . love.  Only out of love.He loved Barbara too much. He loved the children too much.That was the problem.  The only way he could deal with their loss, if he inadvertently killed Barbara, was to kill them.  That was how Richard had dealt with all his problems since he was a child. “But you, Merrick . . . You’ll be the hardest to kill.  You understand that?”“Yes. Daddy,” she said, and she did understand this.  She knew she was his favorite, and she coveted that. ---from The Ice Man

Fatal Vision


Joe McGinniss - 1983
    Jeffrey MacDonald, the handsome, Princeton-educated physician convicted of savagely slaying his young pregnant wife and two small children, murders he vehemently denies committing. Bestselling author Joe McGinnis chronicles every aspect of this horrifying and intricate crime, and probes the life and psyche of the magnetic, all-American Jeffrey MacDonald, a golden boy who seemed destined to have it all. The result is a penetration to the heart of darkness that enshrouded one of the most complex criminal cases ever to capture the attention of the American public. It is haunting, stunningly suspenseful—a work that no reader will be able to forget.With 8 pages of dramatic photos and a special epilogue by the author

A Rose for Her Grave and Other True Cases


Ann Rule - 1993
    Distinguished by the former Seattle policewoman's razor-sharp eye for telling detail and her penetrating analysis of the criminal mind, this gripping collection of accounts drawn from her personal files features the twisting case of Randy Roth, who married -- and murdered -- for profit. In her trademark narrative style, Ann Rule weaves a tale that is riveting, enraging, and heartbreaking all at once, and brilliantly chronicles the fateful confluence of a killer and his female victims, as well as the shattering investigation into Roth's heinous crimes.

Black Eye


Neville Steed - 1989
    won the John Creasey Memorial Award for the best first crime novel of 1986; his second consolidates this promise.’ — The Times 1937, Devon. Johnny Black is a young and penniless pilot turned detective in the glamorous yet dangerous thirties. His girlfriend, the lovely Tracy Spencer-King, enlists him to help a friend, Diana Travers, and the unfolding tragedy becomes his first case. Diana’s sister, Deborah, died a few months before in what Diana believes are suspicious circumstances. Apparently Deborah was riding with her husband, the actor Michael Seagrave, in his new Frazer-Nash sports car on Bigbury Sands when – like the star Isadora Duncan – her long scarf got tangled in the wheels and broke her neck. Despite police being satisfied that Deborah’s death was a tragic accident, Diana thinks that Seagrave murdered his wife. But does Diana know more than she is letting on? Johnny’s investigations soon begin to support Diana’s doubts, for Seagrave proves to be a long standing philanderer and is currently pursuing a girl employed by a dancing academy, Daphne Phipps, and Susan Prendergast the daughter of a rich tycoon. Suspicions deepen when the dancer disappears and Johnny unearths some unsavoury facts about Seagrave’s past. Soon Black is up to his neck in murder and mayhem, as another key figure disappears and a blood-stained jacket turns up on the back of a murderer who has escaped from Dartmoor. It soon becomes clear that whoever is behind the disappearances might just want Johnny and Tracy dead too ... Black Eye, a novel in the great classic tradition of British thrillers, recounts the first case handled by the Black Eye Detective Agency, set up in Torquay, Devon, by a young and impecunious ex-pilot, Johnny Black. Praise for Neville Steed: ‘Steed’s debut Tinplate ... won the John Creasey Memorial Award for the best first crime novel of 1986; his second consolidates this promise.’ — The Times ‘Mr Steed’s sense of humour endears ... all the details about model-making are fascinating.’ — Punch Neville Steed lives in South Devon, where the main action of Black Eye takes place. He read Law at Oxford and has travelled extensively. His interests include anything and everything connected with the motor car, aviation, the cinema and the Art Deco world of the 1930s. He is married with four sons. Endeavour Press is the UK’s leading independent publisher of digital books. For more information on our titles please sign up to our newsletter at www.endeavourpress.com. Each week you will receive updates on free and discounted ebooks. Follow us on Twitter: @EndeavourPress and on Facebook via http://on.fb.me/1HweQV7. We are always interested in hearing from our readers. Endeavour Press believes that the future is now.

Robert Black: The True Story of a Child Rapist and Serial Killer from the United Kingdom


C.L. Swinney - 2015
    Starting at the age of five, he recalls being sexually curious and began placing items in his anus at the age of eight. He'd sexually assault hundreds of little girls before committing his first murder. Sadly, as law enforcement stumbled along with no leads or evidence, Robert Black would strike repeatedly destroying families and preying on innocent little girls in the United Kingdom.

Gaslight Villainy: True Tales of Victorian Murder


Grahame Farrell - 2012
    But where A Mix of Murders covers the Twentieth Century, Gaslight Villainy treats the reader, in exquisite detail, to a selection of fourteen crimes committed during the Victorian period. Founded, as with A Mix of Murders, on meticulous research, Farrell presents these cases with an equally clear, readable and articulate style that demonstrates the author’s fine command of his subject. In one case, Gaslight Villainy educates us in the techniques of execution, and the methods of specific executioners – not, it is clear, an always-professional process performed by ever-adept professionals. In another tale, Farrell shows that lingering abhorrence towards dissection of human cadavers held great sway over resolution of the crimes of the time, and yet shows still how a jury used other lines of reason to find the perpetrator in question guilty. In Voyage of Death, as with the other cases, the reader enjoys excellent characterisation: shipboard existence and the very feel of the vessel itself come to life vividly, thus forming a backdrop to a most intriguing case. Most murders occur on dry land, over which the perpetrator may flee a great distance following their ungodly deed, but murder at sea changes this parameter, and the concomitant effects thus frame this particular case tightly, where one pressing-question is ever to the fore: who exactly was the guilty party? Farrell characterises the times superbly in this book, painting a detailed picture of a culture that relished public executions, where the remoteness of rural murders – counter-intuitively – did not lend a greater chance of escape from the law, and where good-old-fashioned policing was the public’s strongest weapon in the face of malice aforethought. As with A Mix of Murders, the intelligent analyses in Gaslight Villainy give more than enough to satisfy the reader, but the rich context this book gives to its descriptions make it a must-have for true-crime aficionados. If you like your true crime served up with style, clarity and a sense of the times, you owe it to yourself to buy this book post haste. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Chapter Listing: The Lothario of Portland Town Secret Poisoning A Species of Madness The Stoic's Tale The Fickle Waters of the Arran Unservantlike Behaviour The Two Bakers of St. Luke's Insured for Murder A Drop too Much Drink, Drugs and Doctors The Home Improvements of Frederick Deeming The Late Mrs Anderson Incident at Ardlamont Voyage of Death

The Cromwell Street Murders: The Detective's Story


John Bennett - 2005
    This book tells for the first time the story from a police perspective. For ten years, the officer in charge of the investigation, Detective Superintendent John Bennett QPM, has refused to tell his story. Now, together with BBC journalist Graham Gardner, he reveals the full story of how the West's were caught, how the case was prepared and how it nearly failed to come to court. This book chronicles the roles of those who brought down two of Britain's most infamous killers, shedding light on the real heroes of one of the saddest chapters of criminal history. It explores the court processes, the complications of Rose West's trial, her unsuccessful appeal and the difficulty of dealing with witnesses in such a traumatic case. On one level, this is a story of the triumph of good over evil; on another it is a detailed documentation of how a murder investigation really works - the pressures, the commitment and the physical and emotional drain on those who carry out this work.

The Cottage: A True Haunted House Story


Jess Breitling - 2017
    But before long they can’t deny something is very wrong with their new residence, and they find themselves trying to make sense of the unexplainable. After a year of coping with disembodied voices, flying objects, phantom footsteps, and apparitions of red eyes, the family moves away. But things will get even stranger at their new house. The Cottage details the true paranormal experiences of a real family in Southern California. If you enjoy The Cottage, please look for its sequel, The Bungalow.

IMPOSITION: Detectives hunt a serial killer in this gripping mystery (The DI Gardener crime fiction series Book 5)


Ray Clark - 2020
    

A Serial Killer's Daughter: My Story of Faith, Love, and Overcoming


Kerri Rawson - 2019
    When she opened it, an FBI agent informed her that her father had been arrested for murdering ten people, including two children. It was then that she learned her father was the notorious serial killer known as BTK, a name he’d given himself that described the horrific way he committed his crimes: bind, torture, kill. As news of his capture spread, Wichita celebrated the end of a thirty-one-year nightmare. For Kerri Rawson, another was just beginning. She was plunged into a black hole of horror and disbelief. The same man who had been a loving father, a devoted husband, church president, Boy Scout leader, and a public servant had been using their family as a cover for his heinous crimes since before she was born. Everything she had believed about her life had been a lie.Written with candor and extraordinary courage, A Serial Killer’s Daughter is an unflinching exploration of life with one of America’s most infamous killers and an astonishing tale of personal and spiritual transformation. For all who suffer from unhealed wounds or the crippling effects of violence, betrayal, and anger, Kerri Rawson’s story offers the hope of reclaiming sanity in the midst of madness, rebuilding a life in the shadow of death, and learning to forgive the unforgivable.

The Phantom Prince: My Life with Ted Bundy


Elizabeth Kendall - 1981
    However, very rarely do we hear from the women he left behind—the ones forgotten as mere footnotes in this tragedy. This updated and expanded reissue of Elizabeth Kendall’s 1981 book The Phantom Prince chronicles her intense, six-year relationship with Ted Bundy and its eventual unraveling. Featuring a new introduction and a new afterword by the author, never-before-seen photos, and a new chapter from the author’s daughter, Molly, this gripping account presents a remarkable examination of obsession, intrigue, and the darkness that love can mask.