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Crime Books of Note
Crime Magazine's List of Favorite Books on Crime, Criminals, and Criminal Justice
Updated 06/07/09
View Crime Books by Title and Category
~ Alphabetical by Author ~
A - B - C - D - E - F - G - H - I - J - K - L - M - N - O - P - Q - R - S - T - U - V - W - X - Y - Z
Alexander, Shana. When She Was Bad. Dell, 1990. Bess Myerson and the New York City political corruption trial in 1988. Also know as the "Bess Mess."
Anderson, Scott. 4 O'Clock Murders. Dell, 1993. A Mormon family's revenge. A hit list left by a deceased man to his 13 wives and 60 children.
New Favorite: Ayton, Mel. A Racial Crime: James Earl Ray and the Murder of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. ArcheBooks Publishing, 2005. There was no conspiracy. Ray acted alone in assassinating Dr. King.
New Favorite: Beavan, Colin. Fingerprints: The Origins of Crime Detection and the Murder Case That Launched Forensic Science. Hyperion, 2001. The story of how fingerprints came to revolutionize crime detection.
Beck, Janet Parker. Too Good to be True. New York: Penguin Books, 1992. Excerpt from the back cover: "...Anderson was charged with the brutal slaying of his young fiancée. Yet there was no body, no eyewitness, and no real evidence." The murder of Denise Redlick.
Benford, Timothy B. and James P. Johnson. Righteous Carnage: The List Murders. New York: Scribners, 1991. An account of the John List murders.
Berendt, John. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Random House, 1994. A true story of a murder in Savannah with some very quirky characters.
Bernstein, Carl and Bob Woodward. All The President's Men. New York: Warner Books, Inc., 1974. The classic account of the investigative reporting of two young Washington Post reporters who blew the lid on the Watergate scandal.
Begg, Paul. Jack the Ripper: The Uncensored Facts. Robson Books, 1988. A detailed account of the historical facts of the Ripper case, with large amounts of evidence presented including excerpts from police documents. Much detail on suspect Druitt. Unlike most Ripper books, the author's goal is to present the facts rather than advance his own theories, therefore the work is very thorough and unbiased.
Biondi, Ray and Walt Hecox. All His Father's Sins: Inside the Gerald Gallego Sex-Slave Murders. Prima Publishing and Communications, 1988. The story of the only husband and wife serial killers.
Birnie, Lisa Hobbs. Such A Good Boy. Greedy, pampered Darren Hueneman hired his two underage friends to murder his mother and sister.
Bledsoe, Jerry. Bitter Blood. Onyx/Penguin, 1988. Susie Sharp Newsom Lynch and her cousin Fritz Klenner.
Bledsoe, Jerry. Blood Games. New York: Penguin Books, 1991. The story of the death of Lieth von Stein who was beaten to death with a baseball bat as he slept in his home in Washington, N.C., in 1988. Much material here concerning the culture of role playing games such as DandD. Will be of special interest for those who attended or who are attending N.C. State University.
Bloom, John and Jim Atkinson. Evidence of Love. Bantam Books, 1985. Candy Montgomery hacked Betty Gore to death with an axe, hitting her 41 times... in self-defense.
Bobit, Bonnie. Death Row. Bobit Publishing Co., 1989-2000. An annual roster of the more than 3,500 death row inmates, with statistics and analysis, essays and commentary on death-row inmates, capital punishment, and victims' rights.
Boyle, Kevin. Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights and Murder in the Jazz Age. Henry Holt & Co., 2004. The tragic story of Ossian and Gladys Sweet, a young black doctor and his wife who bought a house in a white neighborhood in Detroit in the summer of 1925 and faced a mob of 600 white men, women and children outside their home the second night.
Braidhill, Kathy. Chop Shop. Pinnacle, 1993. A gruesome abuse of public trust. The Lamb Funeral Home scandal in Southern California.
Breault, Marc and Martin King. Inside the Cult. Signet/Penguin, 1993. The store of David Koresh.
Breo, Dennis L. and William J. Martin. Crime of the Century. Bantam Books, 1993. The story of Richard Speck by the prosecutor who put him in prison.
Bugliosi, Vincent with Curt Gentry. Helter Skelter. Bantam 1974.
Burn, Gordon. Somebody's Husband, Somebody's Son. Pan Books London, 1984. The story of the Yorkshire Ripper.
Butterfield, Fox. All God's Children: The Bosket Family and the American Tradition of Violence. Avon, 1996; Perennial, 2002. The effects of racism and poverty on one black family that produced generations of intelligent but disconnected capital offenders.
Cahill, Bette. The Butterbox Babies. Seal Books/McClelland Bantam Canada, 1992. Baby farming for profit in East Chester Nova Scotia.
Cahill, Tim. Buried Dreams: Inside the Mind of a Serial Killer. New York: Bantam Books, 1986. An account of the John Wayne Gacy murders. Based on the investigative reporting of Russ Ewing.
Cantlupe, Joe and Lisa Petrillo. Badge of Betrayal. Avon, 1991. Cop turned murderer.
Carpenter, Teresa. Mob Girl. Zebra, 1992. Arlyne Brickman's thirty-year career in the mob.
Cauffiel, Lowell. Forever and Five Days. Zebra, 1992. The deaths of five female patients in a nursing home in Grand Rapids, Mich.
Chepesiuk, Ron. The Bullet or the Bribe. Praeger Publishers, 2003. History of the 20-year effort by U.S. law enforcement to bring down the Cali Cartel. The Columbian drug ring supplied over 70 percent of the world's cocaine and 75 percent of the world's marijuana.
Clarke, James W. Last Rampage. Escaped convict Gary Tison and his crime spree over the Southwest.
Cook, Thomas H. Early Graves: The shocking true-crime story of the youngest woman ever sentenced to death row. Dutton Books, 1990.
Damore, Leo. In His Garden. Dell, 1981. The Cape Cod murders of four women.
New Favorite: Davies, Robert. Perfection She Dances. Mainstream Publishing, 2001. A firsthand account of the British author's drug smuggling and subsequent imprisonment in Shanghai.
Dean, John. Blind Ambition. New York: Pocket Books, 1977. An account of the Watergate break-in and following cover-up by former presidential counsel John Dean.
Dear, William C. and Carlton Stowers. Please Don't Kill Me. Ballantine, 1989. The murder of wealthy businessman Dean Milo. A story of greed and betrayal.
New Favorite: Diamant, Jeff. Heist! Blair, 2002. Tale of the wacky $17-million heist at the Loomis, Fargo and Co. warehouse in Charlotte, N.C., in 1997.
DuClos, Bernard. Fair Game. St. Martin's Paperbacks, 1993. "To big game hunter Robert Hansen, Alaska was paradise. But for his victims, it was a terrifying wilderness where no one could hear their screams."
Dunning, John. Cryptic Crimes. Arrow Books London, 1990. A selection of 20 baffling murder cases.
Dvorchak, Robert J. and Lisa Holuva. Milwaukee Massacre. Dell, 1991. Jeffrey Dahmer.
Earley, Pete. Family of Spies. Bantam. The John Walker spy ring.
New Favorite: Eddleston, John J. The Encyclopaedia of Executions. Blake Publications, 2002. A case by case account of the 865 people executed in Great Britain during the 20th century.
Egginton, Joyce. From Cradle to Grave. William Morrow and Co., 1989. Mary Beth Tinning and the death of her nine children.
Egginton, Joyce. Too Beautiful a Day to Die. Berkeley, 1991. Published in hardcover as A Day of Fury. Laurie Dann opened fire at an elementary school injuring five and killing one.
Ellroy, James. My Dark Places. Vintage Books, 1997. Popular crime-fiction writer's memoir of his search for the killer of his mother, who was murdered in 1958 in Los Angeles.
Englade, Ken. A Dark and Deadly Love. St. Martins, 1993. Published in hardcover as To Hatred Turned. The ultimate revenge upon a husband and his "other" woman.
Englade, Ken. Beyond Reason: A true story of a shocking double murder, a brilliant and beautiful Virginia socialite and a deadly psychotic obsession. St. Martin's Press, 1990. The Derek and Nancy Hansom murders in Virginia.
Englade, Ken. Deadly Lessons. St. Martin's, 1991. Pam Smart seduced 15-year-old Billy Flynn and got him to murder her husband.
Englade, Ken. Murder in Boston. St. Martin's, 1990. The Stuart murder case. Did he shoot his pregnant wife? Answers that went with him when he committed suicide.
Finstad, Suzanne. Sleeping with the Devil. Avon Books, 1991. Obsessive love. Something of a cross between Sleeping With the Enemy and the OJ story.
Franklin, Eileen and William Wright. Sins of the Father. Ballantine Books, 1991. Twenty years later, Eileen Franklin remembered the unsolved killing of her childhood best friend and the identity of the killer: her father.
French, Thomas. Unanswered Cries. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991. ISNB 0-312-92645-6. The story of the 1984 beating and stabbing murder of Karen Gregory of St. Petersburg, Fla. The author takes a hard look at neighborhood apathy. Several of Karen's neighbors heard her cries for help but did nothing.
Frondorf, Shirley. Death of Jewish American Princess. Berkeley, 1990. The acquittal of Sten Steinberg, who stabbed his wife 26 times.
Ganey, Terry. St. Joseph's Children: A True Story of Terror and Justice. Carol Publishing Group, 1989. (Softcover title is Innocent Blood.) The story of killer Charles Hatcher who killed 16 people in St. Joseph, Mo.
Gaute, J. H. H. and Robin O'Dell. The New Murderers' Who's Who. Headline Book Publishing, 1989. Crime buff encyclopedia.
Geis, Gilbert and Leigh B. Bienen. Crimes of the Century. Northwestern University Press, 1998. Insightful analysis of five dramatic trials of the 20th Century: Leopold and Loeb; the Scottsboro "boys;" Bruno Richard Hauptmann and the Lindbergh kidnapping; Alger Hiss; and O.J. Simpson.
Gelb, Alan. Most Likely to Succeed. St. Martin's, 1990. Seventeen-year-old Wyley Gates shot his father and his girlfriend, his brother and a 3-year old orphaned nephew.
Gilmour, Walter and Leland E. Hale. Butcher, Baker. Onyx/Penguin, 1991. Alaskan serial killer Robert Hansen.
Ginsburg, Philip E. The Shadow of Death: The Hunt for a Serial Killer. Charles Scribners and Sons, 1993. The hunt for a man who has killed at least six women and children in New Hampshire, Vermont, and the Connecticut River Valley.
Gray, A. W. Poisoned Dreams: A true story of murder, money, and family secrets. Dutton Books, 1994.
Graysmith, Robert. The Murder of Bob Crane. Berkeley, 1994. After 13 years, the arrest of a possible suspect in the murder of Hogan's Heroes Bob Crane.
Graysmith, Robert. Zodiac. Mondo Books, 1992. ISBN 1 85286 432 X. Highly recommended book. Contains pictures of postcards, letters, ciphers etc. sent by Zodiac to newspapers and police. Provides an intriguing analysis of Zodiac, written by an excellent author.
Green, Ben. The Soldier of Fortune Murders. Dell, 1992. John Wayne Hearn placed a killer-for-hire ad in the Soldier of Fortune magazine.
Gribetz, Kenneth and H. Paul Jeffers. Murder Along the Way. Berkeley, 1991. A selection of true crime in suburbia by the man who prosecuted them.
Gugliotta, Guy and Jeff Lean. Kings of Cocaine. An investigative history of the Colombian Medellin cartel.
Hall, Neal. The Deaths of Cindy James. McClelland and Stewart Canada, 1990. A woman plagued for years by assault, robbery etc. found dead in 1989. Was it murder or was it suicide? The police believe the attacks were self-inflicted.
Hammer, Richard. The Court-Martial of Lt. Calley. New York: Coward, McCann and Geoghegan, Inc., 1971. An account of the investigation following the My Lai massacre in Vietnam in March 1968.
Harr, Jonathan. A Civil Action. Vintage Books, 1996. A spellbinding account of the civil suit brought against Beatrice Food Cos. and W. R. Grace by the families of leukemia victims in Woburn, Mass.
Harris, Ellen. Dying To Get Married. Harper/Collins, 1991. The romance murder of Julie Bulloch by her husband Dennis.
Harter, Karl. Winter of Frozen Dreams. Pinnacle Books/Windsor Publishing, 1990. The murder of two men in Madison, Wis. One of the men was hired to kill the other.
Herzog, Arthur. The Wood Chipper Murder. Zebra, 1989. Richard Crafts killed his wife and disposed of her body by putting her through a wood chipper.
Horton, Sue. The Billionaire Boys Club. St. Martin's, 1989. Joe Hunt and the murder of Ron Levin and Hedayat Eslaminia.
Hoy, Claire and Victor Ostrovsky. By Way of Deception. General Paperbacks Canada, 1991. The insiders portrait of the Mossad.
Irving, Clifford. Daddy's Girl. Zebra, 1988. The Campbell murder case.
Jackman, Tom and Troy Cole. Rites of Burial. Pinnacle Books, 1992. Kansas City, Mo., butcher Robert Berdella.
Jones, Aphrodite. Cruel Sacrifice. New York: Pinnacle Books, 1994. The story of the 1992 murder of 12-year-old Shanda Sharer of Indiana who was killed by four other teenage girls led by Shanda's ex-lesbian lover. She was beaten and sexually assaulted with a tire iron and then set afire. This book takes a disturbing look at young "punk" culture.
Kadish, Sanford H., ed. Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice. New York: Free Press, c1983.
Kaihla, Paul and Ross Laver. Savage Messiah. Seal Books/McClelland Bantam Canada, 1994. The cult of Rock Theriault. Makes Koresh look like a choirboy.
Kelly, John F. and Phillip K. Wearne. Tainting Evidence. The Free Press, 1998. How the FBI's vaunted forensic lab routinely distorted evidence in hundreds of cases, including the Oklahoma City bombing, the Unabomber case, the O.J. Simpson prosecution, and the World Trade Center explosion. The book also shows how the FBI's famed investigators cannot be trusted to investigate themselves.
Kingsbury, Karen. Final Vows. Dell, 1992. A marriage made in prison and murder along the way.
Kingsbury, Karen. Missy's Murder. Dell, 1991. Two teenage girls kill another. One other friend, scared for her life, kept the secret.
New Favorite: Knappman, Edward W. American Trials of the 20th Century. Visible Ink Press, 1994. An even-handed presentation of 145 of the most famous -- and infamous -- trials conducted in the United States during the 20th century, concluding with the O. J. Simpson trial.
Kolarik, Gera-Lind and Wayne Klatt. I Am Cain. Avon Books, 1994. Newlyweds Nancy and Richard Langert were shot to death April 7, 1990, in Winnetka, Ill. She left a brief illegible message scrawled in her own blood.
Leveritt, Mara. The Boys on the Tracks. St. Martin's Press, 1999. A meticulous story of betrayal and public corruption. When local Arkansas authorities ruled that the deaths of two teenage boys -- run over by a train as their bodies lay across the tracks -- were drug-related suicides, the mother of one of the boys launched a decade's long crusade to prove they had been murdered and to bring their killers to justice.
Levy, Steven. The Unicorn's Secret. Penguin, 1988. The case of Ira Einhorm and the murder of his girlfriend Holly Maddux. He is still at large.
New Favorite: Lief, Michael S. Co-authored by Mitchell Caldwell and Ben Bycel. Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury. Touchstone, 1998. A review, with commentary, of 10 of the greatest closing arguments presented in modern law, including the Nuremberg Trials, the Chicago Seven, Leopold and Loeb, Manson, Medgar Evers, DeLorean, and My Lai.
New Favorite: Lindorff, David P. Jr. Killing Time: An Investigation Into the Death Row Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal. Common Courage Press, 2003. A groundbreaking review of the case involving Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Lindsey, Robert. A Gathering of Saints. Dell, 1988. Master forger Mark Hoffman and the Mormon Church.
Lindsey, Robert. Irresistible Impulse. Dell, 1992. Michael Telling, from one of the wealthiest families in England, kills his American wife and gets away with it.
Linedecker, Clifford L. Deadly White Female. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994. Story of the murder of Roger Paulson in Washington, D.C. by a female con-artist who met him through the want-ads.
Linedecker, Clifford L. The Man Who Killed Boys. New York: St. Martin's Paperbacks, 1986, c1980. An account of the John Wayne Gacy murders.
Long, Bruce. William Desmond Taylor: A Dossier. Scarecrow Press, 1991. An account of the 1922 murder of film director Desmond Taylor. Includes recaps of the case by two detectives who worked on the investigation, and an analysis of two previous books on the murder.
MacLean, Harry N. In Broad Daylight. New York: Dell Publishing, 1981. Excerpt from the back cover: "Ken McElroy had robbed, raped, burned, shot... and maimed the citizens of Skidmore, Mo., without conscience or remorse... On July 10, 1981, [he] was shot to death on the main street of this small farming community. Forty-five people watched. No indictments were ever issued, no trial held - and the town... has protected the killers with silence to this day."
Malcolm, Andrew H., Final Harvest: An American Tragedy. New York: Times Books, c1986. An account of a not-so-famous murder of a New England banker in a small Midwest town. An interesting expose of culture clash.
Malik, Kirk. Redrum the Innocent. Penguin Canada, 1993. Guy Paul Morin was arrested and convicted for the murder of a young neighbor. Is he guilty, or was he a victim of police "Tunnel Vision"?
Manson, Charles. Manson in His Own Words. New York: Grove Press, 1986.
Markman, Ronald, MD, and Dominick Bosco. Alone With the Devil. Bantam, 1990. Cases of a courtroom psychiatrist.
Mayer, Robert. The Dreams of Ada. Signet/Penguin, 1991. The disappearance and murder of a young woman in Ada, Okla. Though her body was not found, Tommy Ward and Karl Fontenot were convicted and sentenced to death.
McClellan, Bill. Evidence of Murder. New York: Penguin Books, 1993. An account of the murder of Julie Post, wife of New Orleans businessman, Ed Post. Julie turns up dead one morning in the couple's hotel room bathtub in St. Louis, the victim of an apparent slip and fall. But further examination of the physical evidence reveals a suspicious death. Some good information here about maintaining a chain of evidence as well as about Louisiana's Napoleonic Code.
McGinniss, Joe. Blind Faith. Signet/Penguin, 1989. The murder of Maria Marshall by her husband Rob. The other side of role-model suburbia.
McGinniss, Joe. Fatal Vision. New York: New American Library, 1984. The story of Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald who was convicted of the 1970 murder of his wife and two children at Fort Bragg. The author presents a complex and compelling psycho-theory that attempts to explain how and why MacDonald did it.
McGuire, Christine and Carla Norton. Perfect Victim. New York: Dell Publishing, 1988. An account of the kidnapping and abuse of Colleen Stan, a.k.a. "The girl in the box" in 1977.
Meyer, Peter. The Yale Murder. Berkeley, 1982. Upper-class girl meets lower-class guy on scholarship at Yale. The romance and murder of Bonnie Garland.
Michaud, Stephen G. Ted Bundy: Conversations with a Killer. New York: New American Library, 1989. Interview with Ted Bundy.
Moore, Kelly and Dan Reed. Deadly Medicine. St. Martin's, 1988. Nurse Genene Jones was addicted to the "Code Blue" emergency. The story of over 30 infant deaths in Texas.
Mulgrew, Ian. Final Payoff. Seal/McClelland Bantam Canada, 1990. Child murderer Clifford Olson was paid $10,000 by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to reveal the location and bodies of 11 of his victims.
Naifeh, Steven and Gregory White Smith. The Mormon Murders. New York: Penguin Books Inc., 1988. An account of a rare documents forger, Mormon Mark Hoffman, who detonated two pipe bombs in Salt Lake City in 1985 killing two people (and almost killing himself). This book offers insight into the history and inner-workings of the Mormon Church.
Nash, Jay Robert. Bloodletters and Badmen: A Narrative Encyclopedia of American Criminals from the Pilgrims to the Present. New York: M. Evans and Company, Inc., 1995. ISBN 0-87131-777-X
Newton, Michael. The Encyclopedia of Serial Killers. Checkmark Books, 2000. ISBN 0-8160-3978-X. An attempt to demystify the serial killer. A wide sampling of the more than 1,500 serial murderers on record broken down into specific killer types, motivations, and nationalities. Since 1980, 84 percent of the world's serial killers have been U.S. citizens.
Newton, Michael. Serial Slaughter: What's behind America's murder epidemic? Loompanics Unlimited, 1992. ISBN 1-55950-078-6 Contains quotes, pictures, statistics. The author explains what factors may turn people into serial killers, shows similarities in different killer's psychological profiles, etc.
Newton, Michael. Silent Rage. Dell Books, 1994. The 30-year odyssey of a serial killer. The story of Carrroll Edward Cole who was executed in Nevada in 1985. A good book about the genesis of a psychopathic killer.
O'Brien, Darcy. Murder in Little Egypt. Onyx/Penguin, 1989. The murder of Sean Caveness by his father, Dr. Dale John Caveness.
O'Brien, Darcy O. Two of a Kind: The Hillside Stranglers. New American Library, 1985.
O'Donnell, Thomas J. Crazymaker. Harper, 1992. The mother who conspired with her own son to kill her stepson.
Olsen, Gregg. Abandoned Prayers. Popular Books/Warner, 1990. Ex-Amish Eli Stutzman who killed his roommate and his own son.
Olsen, Gregg. Bitter Almonds. Warner Brothers Books, 1993. The true story of mothers, daughters and the Seattle cyanide murders.
Olsen, Jack. The Misbegotten Son: A Serial Killer and His Victims. Delacort Press, 1993. The true story of Arthur J. Shawcross.
Olsen, Jack. Doc - The Rape of the Town of Lovell. Atheneum/Macmillan, 1989. The story of Dr. John Story's rape of over 150 women in the Mormon community of Lovell, Wyo..
O'Malley, Martin. Gross Misconduct. Peguin books Canada, 1988. Ex-NHL player Brian "Spinner" Spencer.
Persico, Joseph E. Casey: The Lives and Secrets of William J. Casey. New York: Penguin Books, 1990. An exhaustive biography of William Casey from childhood, through his OSS years to his directorship of the CIA. Much light is shed on Casey's role in the Iran-Contra scandal. The author also attempts to debunk Woodward's claim in Veil that he interviewed Casey on his deathbed and received a confession of criminal wrongdoing.
Penn, Gareth. Times 17: The Amazing Story of the Zodiac Murders in California and Massachusetts 1966-1981. San Rafael, California: Foxglove Press, 1987. An account of the Zodiac murders.
Pettit, Mark. A Need to Kill. Ivy Books, 1990. Children murdering children. The crimes of John Joubert who was barely older than his young victims.
Philpin, John and John Donnelly. Beyond Murder. Penguin, 1994. The Gainesville, Fla., student murders.
Priest, Lisa. A Conspiracy of Silence. McClelland and Stewart Publishers Canada, 1989. The death of Helen Betty Osborne. The town knew who the killers were but she was only an Indian. The 10-year silence.
Pron, Nick and Kevin Donovan. Crime Story. Seal Books/McClelland Bantam Canada, 1992. Two reporters caught in the middle of the "Body Parts" murder case.
Provost, Gary. Without Mercy. Pocket Books, 1990. Dee Casteel and Allen Bryant murdered Art Venecia and his mother.
Ressler, Robert K. and Tom Shachtman. Whoever Fights Monsters: My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992. Profiles the career of FBI veteran and ex-Army CID colonel Robert Ressler. Lots of analysis of serial killer Ed Kemper.
Reynolds, Michael. Dead Ends. Warner Books, 1992. Aileen Wuornos, a very rare female serial killer.
Rule, Ann. A Rose for Her Grave. Pocket, 1993. A selection from her true-crime files.
Rule, Ann. Everything She Ever Wanted. Pocket Books, 1992. Things got dangerous when Pat Taylor didn't get her way.
Rule, Ann. Lust Killer. New York: Signet Books, 1983. The story of the murders of Jerome Brudos, one of the first of the modern serial killers.
Rule, Ann. If You Really Loved Me. New York: Pocket Books, 1992.
Rule, Ann. Small Sacrifices. Signet/Penguin, 1987. The story of Diane Downs who murdered her children. One survived out of three.
Rule, Ann. The I-5 Killer. Signet/Penguin, 1984. Randy Woodfield's attacks of rape and murder along California I-5.
Rule, Ann. The Stranger Beside Me. Signet/Penguin, 1981. Serial killer Ted Bundy.
Ryzuk, Mary S. Thou Shalt Not Kill. Library/Warner Books, 1990. The story of John List who murdered his family and evaded capture for 18 years.
Salerno, Steve. Deadly Blessing. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987. An account of the death of Price Daniel, Jr., a wealthy Texan who married a Dairy Queen waitress.
Sanders, Ed. The Family. Signet/Penguin, 1989. Charles Manson and his "family."
St. Clair, David. Say You Love Satan. Dell, 1987. Three teenage boys' search for thrills leads them past drugs and theft. Satanism.
Sandiford, Kay with Alan Burgess. Shattered Night. Warner Brothers Books, 1984. The wife of an eminent heart surgeon reveals the story behind the murder trial that rocked Texas, the terror, the torture, the truth.
Sasse, Cynthia Stalter and Peggy Murphy Widder. The Kirtland Massacre. Zebra, 1991. Cult leader Jeff Lundgren and the murder of 5 people.
Siegel, Barry. A Death in White Bear Lake. Bantam, 1991. Back when child abuse was either hushed up or ignored; the story of the death of one small boy.
Singular, Stephen with Tim and Danielle Hill. A Killing in the Family. Avon Books, 1991. A 14-year-old confesses to the murder of her stepmother to protect her father.
Smith, Carlton. Fatal Charm. Onyx/Penguin, 1993. The North American Bluebeard. Serial wife-killer Randy Roth.
Smith, Carlton and Thomas Guillen. The Search for the Green River Killer. Onyx/Penguin, 1991. At least 49 murders committed during the 1980's - mostly prostitutes.
Smith, Gene. High Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1985. ISBN 0-07-058478-8 Presents a detailed account of the title subject within its historical context.
Soble, Ron and John Johnson. Blood Brothers. Onyx/Penguin, 1994. The Menendez murders. Ends after their first trial.
Springer, Patricia. Blood Rush. Pinnacle Books/Windsor Publishing, 1994. Ricky Lee Green was abused as a child and abused as an adult. The story of a whole family gone wrong.
Stevens, Shane. By Reason of Insanity. Dell, 1979. Chronicle of Thomas Bishop, an escapee from an institution for the criminally insane.
Stevens, William Randolph. Deadly Intentions: An Extraordinary Crime... the Prosecutor's Own Account. Congdon and Weed, 1982.
Stoll, Cliff. The Cuckoo's Egg. New York: Pocket Books, 1990. The story of a Berkeley UNIX operator's attempts to locate a computer hacker. Gives a good overview of international computer networking and related security concerns.
Stowers, Carlton. Careless Whispers. Pocket Books, 1986. The murder of three teenagers, and the policeman who promised them he would find their killer.
Sullivan, Robert. Goodbye Lizzie Borden. Brattleboro, Vermont: S. Greene Press, 1974. An account of the Lizzie Borden murders.
Sullivan, Terry. Killer Clown. New York: Grosset and Dunlap, c1983. An account of the John Wayne Gacy murders.
Swindle, Howard. Once a Hero. Dell, 1989. Vietnam-vet turned bank robber Jim Little.
Tanenbaum, Robert and Peter S. Greenberg. The Piano Teacher: The True Story of a Psychotic Killer. New American Library, 1987. The story of Charles Yulk.
New Favorite: Thomas, Steve. JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation. St. Martin's Press, 2000. The former lead detective gives his account of the botched investigation and how the Ramseys managed to avoid indictment in connection with their daughter's murder.
Thompson, Thomas. Blood and Money. Dell, 1981. Joan Robinson Hill died after a mysterious illness. Her husband was tried for her murder, which resulted in a mistrial. He was murdered afterwards.
Toobin, Jeffrey. A Vast Conspiracy. Touchstone, 2000. A finely-written, well-researched account of the right-wing's conspiracy to topple President Clinton.
Treen, Joe and Maria Eftimiades. My Name is Katherine. St Martin's, 1990. Ten-year-old Kathy Beers abducted and held captive for 16 days in an underground box.
Vallee, Brian. Life With Billy. Seal Books/McClelland Bantam Canada, 1986. The abusive marriage that drove Jane Stafford to murder her husband.
van Hoffman, Eric. Venom in the Blood. Zebra, 1990. Husband and wife thrill killers Gerald and Charlene Gallego. See the book All His Father's Sins.
van Over, Raymond. In a Father's Rage. Pinnale, 1991. A marriage made in heaven that became a hell of addiction and murder.
various writers. Greed Killers. Pinnacle Books, 1993. Twenty-five cases of greed killing.
Vogel, Steve. Reasonable Doubt. Chicago, Ill.: Contemporary Books, 1989. An account of the axe murder of a mother and her three children in Bloomington, Ill., in 1983. The husband, David Hendricks, who claimed to have been away on a business trip at the time of the murders was arrested and tried. The validity of estimations of time of deaths by using stomach contents is a major component of this case.
Walker, Roger. Silent Testimony. St. Martin's, 1984. The first murder conviction in New York state without a body.
Walton, Mary. For Love of Money. Pocket Books/Simon and Schuster, 1987. Steven Benson (of the wealthy Tobacco Bensons) who killed his mother and his brother with a car bomb.
Wambaugh, Joseph. The Blooding. Bantam, 1989. The first use of genetic fingerprinting to capture the murderer of two girls in England.
Ward Jouve, Nicole. The Streetcleaner: the Yorkshire Ripper Case on Trial. London: M. Boyars, 1986. The story of Peter Sutcliffe, a.k.a. The Yorkshire Ripper.
Weber, Don W. and Charles Bosworth, Jr. Precious Victims. New York: Penguin Books, 1991. The story of Paula and Robert Sims who killed two of their children, claiming that their children had been abducted.
Weber, Don W. and Charles Bosworth Jr. Secret Lessons. Onyx/Penguin, 1994. Child abuse by the "perfect" teacher.
Weber, Don W. and Charles Bosworth, Jr. Silent Witness. Onyx Books, 1993. The story of the Karla Brown murder case.
Wick, Steve. Bad Company. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Publishers, 1990. The "Cotton Club Murders" of Roy Radin and Larry Greenberger.
Wolfe, Linda. Wasted. Pocket Books, 1989. The Preppie murder of Jennifer Levin by Robert Chambers.
Wright, Nancy. A Mother's Trial. Bantam, 1984.
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Crime Books of Note.
Crime Magazine's list of favorite books on crime, criminals, and criminal justice. View list sorted by author, or sorted alphabetically by title or by category.
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