Why did I love this book?
This book is brilliantly researched by its author. The oil rich land of the Osage Indian nation became a magnet for government corruption, greed, evil, and serial murders. The Osage murder investigations of the 1920s in Oklahoma became a showcase for the new, modern Bureau of Investigation and its twenty-nine-year-old Director, J. Edgar Hoover. I worked directly for Hoover during his final years and was not aware of the Osage murders until reading Grann’s book. The popular FBI tour in Washington offered displays of the “Gangster Era”, the scourge of Communism, and successful investigations of major crimes—but nothing of the sensational Osage murders. Killers of the Flower Moon answers the reasons why.
23 authors picked Killers of the Flower Moon as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Indian nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, they rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions and sent their children to study in Europe.
Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. As the death toll climbed, the FBI took up the case. But the bureau badly bungled the investigation. In desperation, its young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White to unravel the mystery. Together with the Osage he and his undercover…