Swift Justice: Murder & Vengeance In A California Town


Harry Farrell - 1992
    In the days that followed, the Harts, local and state police, and J. Edgar Hoover's FBI scrambled to outwit the kidnappers, whose demands kept them at bay until they--and Brook Hart's murder--were at last discovered.Then the unthinkable: A band of vigilantes stormed the San Jose jail and hanged the two criminals in the town square as ten thousand watched. The next day the governor hailed the lynching as "a fine lesson". The San Jose lynching, which divided the nation and haunts the city still, is a chilling tale of fear, fury, and the collapse of justice--of a small American paradise turned inferno.

Scottsboro: A Tragedy of the American South


Dan T. Carter - 1971
    Covers the Scottsboro case since its inception as a 1931 freight car incident, accentuating national and international ramifications.

Son of a Grifter: The Twisted Tale of Sante and Kenny Kimes, the Most Notorious Con Artists in America: A Memoir By The Other Son


Kent Walker - 2001
    Suddenly, America was transfixed by a pair of real-life film noir characters. The media couldn't get enough of the twisted relationship between Sante Kimes and her twenty-three-year-old son Kenny.But the most chilling story of all was never told—until now. Kent Walker, Sante's elder son, reveals how he survived forty years of "the Dragon Lady's" very special brand of motherly love and still managed to get away.As a child Kent watched his mother destroy his hardworking father, Ed Walker, and then—with Kent's painful collusion—snare what Sante called "my millionaire." When she married seemingly respectable real-estate developer Ken Kimes, it was a match made in hell.For the next two decades Kent's mother and stepfather indulged in a globetrotting orgy of criminal behaviour.Kent, their would-be recruit, was privy to the family business—torching houses, defrauding friends, crashing White When Kent's half-brother, Kenny was born, Kent was twelve years old—old enough to know that he was his younger sibling's only protector. Kent tried desperately to save Kenny from his mother's sinister bidding. His failure haunts him to this day.

A Payroll To Meet: A Story Of Greed, Corruption, and Football At SMU


David Whitford - 1989
    The school’s football team was the pride of the university and the city. Before the late 1970s, however, the relatively small school had trouble recruiting and struggled to keep up with the big-time football universities that were often more than double its size. Under pressure to compete, the SMU football program engaged in ethics, rules, and recruiting violations for years. When the corruption came to light, the NCAA handed out its most serious punishment in the history of college sports—the “death penalty”—which cancelled the team’s entire 1987 schedule.In A Payroll to Meet, author David Whitford details the Mustangs’ descent into corruption and the fallout when it was discovered. Most egregiously, the football program ran a huge slush fund that was used to pay players from the mid-1970s through 1986. Bill Clements, chairman of the SMU board and soon to be reelected governor of Texas, knew all about the slush fund before the NCAA did. He opted, however, to phase out the payments rather than stop them immediately, for fear that angry players might go public and create still more problems for SMU. Clements and the athletic director Bob Hitch decided that the football program had “a payroll to meet.”

Conviction: Solving the Moxley Murder: A Reporter and a Detective's 20-Year Search for Justice


Leonard Levitt - 1990
    She never made it. Her brutal murder with a golf club in her own backyard made national headlines. But for years no one was arrested, despite troubling clues pointing to the Skakels, a rich and powerful family related to the Kennedys. After the police department's first unsuccessful attempts to catch the killer, the case lay dormant, and the culprit remained free.Enter Leonard Levitt. In 1982, the Stamford Advocate and Greenwich Time newspapers asked investigative reporter Levitt to look into the murder and the undying rumors of a cover-up. Levitt soon uncovered groundbreaking information about how the police had bungled the investigation, and he learned that Tommy and Michael had lied about their activities on the night of the murder. But Levitt's articles about his findings -- and the haunting questions they raised -- almost never saw the light of day. For years, Levitt's superiors mysteriously refused to publish the stories. Convinced that the Moxley family deserved the peace and closure they had so long been denied, Levitt fought desperately to keep his discoveries alive. Finally, after Levitt's first article appeared, the case was reopened.Enter Frank Garr. As the newly appointed investigator on the Moxley case, the seasoned Greenwich detective doggedly pursued unexplored leads and became increasingly convinced that for over a decade, his colleagues had been pursuing the wrong suspects. At first mistrustful of one another, as reporters and detectives often are, Levitt and Garr became friends, encouraging each other in their quest for the truth as the obstacles against them piled up.In 2002, more than twenty-five years after Moxley's death, a shocked world watched as Michael Skakel was convicted of the murder, thanks largely to the evidence Garr alone had marshaled against him.Now, for the first time, Leonard Levitt tells the amazing true story of Garr's fight to solve the case and of how their friendship with each other, and with Martha Moxley's mother, Dorthy, sustained them over the years. A riveting, suspenseful drama that unfolds like a mystery novel, this incredible memoir also reveals how a police officer and a reporter refused to give up, and how they helped justice to prevail, against all odds.

On Rocky Top: A Front-Row Seat to the End of an Era


Clay Travis - 2009
    The book chronicles the 2008 season, during which the team suffered its second worst record ever and Head Coach Phil Fulmer, the most beloved and recognized man in Tennessee, was fired. Author of Dixieland Delight, Clay Travis offers a fascinating inside look at the inner workings of a major college sports program, and chronicles a season of promise that went terribly wrong, ending a long, fabled era.

Tribal: College Football and the Secret Heart of America


Diane Roberts - 2015
    Same as many big time collegiate sports programs. Seems no matter how the team transgresses off the field, if they excel on the field, everyone forgives them. Writer, professor and conflicted Seminole Diane Roberts looks at the problems plaguing her campus in Tallahassee, examining them within the context of college football itself and its significance in American life, and explores how the game shapes our culture.

Pros and Cons: The Criminals Who Play in the NFL


Jeff Benedict - 1998
    Reprint. NYT.

A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T.E. Lawrence


John E. Mack - 1976
    Lawrence's inner life and his historically significant actions. Extensive research provides the basis for Mack's sensitive investigation of the psychological dimensions of Lawrence's personality and with the history, sociology, and politics of his time. 27 photos.

Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopedia


John Clute - 1993
    This lavish volume, studded with graphics and nuggets of information, is the pleasing result. Science Fiction : The Illustrated Encyclopedia showcases the prophecy and pageantry of science fiction. It weaves together world history with literary history and technical developments with SF trends, providing a cultural context to the Zeitgeist of the genre. Words truly cannot do justice to the visual delights of this colorful tome: time lines, charts, author biographies and bibliographies complete with photos and signatures, illustrated analyses of SF traditions, magazine covers, classic book covers, film and television snapshots, and historical photos. Use it as a reference, read it through, or pick it up and enjoy it in bits. Science Fiction : The Illustrated Encyclopedia will arouse curiosity, joy, and pride in the hearts of SF lovers. --Bonnie Bouman

A Civil War: Army vs. Navy - A Year Inside College Football's Purest Rivalry


John Feinstein - 1996
    Bestselling sportswriter John Feinstein follows the Army and Navy teams for a single season.

The Sweet Season: A Sportswriter Rediscovers Football, Family, and a Bit of Faith at Minnesota's St. John's University


Austin Murphy - 2001
    The time has come, he concludes, to fly beneath the radar of big-league sports, to while away a season with the Johnnies. So, he moves his family to the middle of Minnesota to chronicle a season at St. John's, a Division III program that has reached unparalleled success under the unorthodox guidance of John "Gags" Gagliardi.The Sweet Season is an account of what happens when a family pulls up stakes and spends months in a strange and wonderful place. It is also, not incidentally, the story of the most incredible football program in the country, run by a smiling sage who has forgotten more about the game than most of his peers will ever know.

Sea of Slaughter


Farley Mowat - 1984
    In this timeless narrative, Farley Mowat describes in harrowing detail the devastation inflicted upon the birds, whales, fish, and mammals of this icy coast—from polar bears and otters to cod, seals, and ducks. Since its first publication some 20 years ago, this powerful work has served as both a warning to humanity and an inspiration for change.

Snitch Jacket


Christopher Goffard - 2007
    Combining elements of classic noir, dark comedy, and a misfits memoir reminiscent of Notes from the Underground, Goffard brings life to the darker side of West Coast counter-culture, in a literary crime novel that will delight readers.

Until the Twelfth of Never: The Deadly Divorce of Dan and Betty Broderick


Bella Stumbo - 1993
    Featured on Oprah!.