I’m a window-seat person. If I’m on a trip, I want to see much
more than the device propelling me forward. In crime books, the vehicle is
always the crime, but I want that felonious little engine to also propel me
through realms where I become more explorer than passenger, where I’ve entered marvelous
and unexpected worlds that become characters in themselves. It almost doesn’t
matter what that world is, whether it’s 19th-century Chicago
architecture, bitcoin cartels or octopus linguistics. As long as it’s well-researched and rendered with depth, precision, and passion, your ticket to a
crime gets you at least two books, or even genres, for one!
I wrote...
The Last Counterfeiter: The Story of Fake Money, Real Art, and Forging the Impossible $100 Bill
The true story of master counterfeiter Arthur J. Williams Jr, a brilliant, disadvantaged kid from Chicago's South Side who embarked on a "holy grail" quest to create a perfect replica of the most secure US bill ever made. The all-consuming effort would take him deep into America’s criminal underworld and establish him as one of the greatest counterfeiters of our time, propelling him into a life most of us only dream about. It would also make him one of the Secret Service’s most wanted criminals.
Far more than a story about crime, The Last Counterfeiter is also a compulsively readable exploration of family, our relationship with money as a society, and one man’s quest to turn all of it into redemptive artistic expression.
Erik Larson is known for his masterful ability to combine meticulous research with rich prose to breathe life into history. This book, with intersecting narratives of a serial killer and a brilliant architect set at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago, painted such a living picture for me that I still felt stuck to the canvas even when I wasn’t reading.
I learned about astonishing true events and characters I barely knew existed. The contrast between the great inventors on the grand stage of the fair and the killer haunting its shadow was superbly done.
The Chicago World Fair was the greatest fair in American history. This is the story of the men and women whose lives it irrevocably changed and of two men in particular- an architect and a serial killer. The architect is Daniel Burnham, a man of great integrity and depth. It was his vision of the fair that attracted the best minds and talents of the day. The killer is Henry H. Holmes. Intelligent as well as handsome and charming, Holmes opened a boarding house which he advertised as 'The World's Fair Hotel' Here in the neighbourhood where he was once…
This was a transformative read for me, taking me so deep into the world of turn of the century New York City that it felt like Carr was introducing me to new possibilities as a writer.
Carr is a historian as well as a novelist, and many of the landmarks, neighborhoods, and streets in this book took on a deeper meaning for me afterward. The crime narrative, which takes place during a pivotal moment in the evolution of modern criminology, is so propulsive and fascinating that I was holding my breath through some of the wonderfully spooky scenes.
I devoured this book with as much pleasure as his characters took in the scenes where they dine at Delmonico’s.
The internationally bestselling historical thriller, now a major Netflix series starring Luke Evans, Dakota Fanning and Daniel Bruhl.
Some things never change.
New York City, 1896. Hypocrisy in high places is rife, police corruption commonplace, and a brutal killer is terrorising young male prostitutes.
Unfortunately for Police Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt, the psychological profiling of murderers is a practice still in its infancy, struggling to make headway against the prejudices of those who prefer the mentally ill - and the 'alienists' who treat them - to be out of sight as well as out of mind.
In the best true-crime books, the crime itself is often indicative of a much deeper underworld that has violently broken through our norms, revealing a portal that the author then bravely descends into. Krakauer’s voyage into the fanatical religious roots beneath a horrific double murder had me riveted.
His razor-sharp prose is so clear and haunting, and I was spellbound as he moved effortlessly between the past and present narratives. This book starkly reminded me of how important it is for America to always confront the demons of its past with open eyes, unglazed by anything but the facts, and what the consequences can be when we bury it.
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the author of Into the Wild and Into Thin Air, this extraordinary work of investigative journalism takes readers inside America’s isolated Mormon Fundamentalist communities. Now an the acclaimed FX limited series streaming on HULU.
“Fantastic.... Right up there with In Cold Blood and The Executioner’s Song.” —San Francisco Chronicle
Defying both civil authorities and the Mormon establishment in Salt Lake City, the renegade leaders of these Taliban-like theocracies are zealots who answer only to God; some 40,000 people still practice polygamy in these communities.
At the core of Krakauer’s book are brothers Ron and Dan Lafferty,…
My favorite true crime books—and most of my favorite non-fiction books—tend to be character-driven, read like novels, and tell a larger story through the protagonist’s lens. I found myself getting lost in George Jung’s journey as a drug smuggler and loving that sometimes it felt almost incidental that he was at the criminal nexus of a massive cultural phenomenon taking place.
I also love it when books and protagonists create conflicting emotional reactions. Jung’s likeability, coupled with the destructiveness of the business he helped pioneer, rings true to life; I found myself rooting for him at times, then despising him, and always wondering where the chips would fall in this improbable journey.
BLOW is the unlikely story of George Jung's roller coaster ride from middle-class high school football hero to the heart of Pable Escobar's Medellin cartel-- the largest importer of the United States cocaine supply in the 1980s. Jung's early business of flying marijuana into the United States from the mountains of Mexico took a dramatic turn when he met Carlos Lehder, a young Colombian car thief with connections to the then newly born cocaine operation in his native land. Together they created a new model for selling cocaine, turning a drug used primarily by the entertainment elite into a massive…
Carl Hiassen is so good at leading readers on hysterical romps through the corrupt and criminal underbelly of modern-day Florida that almost any of his books could make my list, but this one stood out for me.
His digs on the plastic surgery and landscaping industries, Geraldo-style sensationalism and vanity, and the sheer absurdity of a hit man riding around naked on a jet ski had me in stitches. Books do not have to be “serious” to be great, and I would argue any day that, collectively, Hiassen’s crime books provide one of the best commentaries on Florida’s dark side.
Bestselling author Carl Hiaasen serves up a humorous helping of "taut, fast-paced action...crisp and hot" (The New York Times).
After dispatching a pistol-packing intruder from his home with the help of a stuffed Marlin head, Mick Stranahan can't deny that someone is out to get him. His now-deceased intruder carries no I.D., and as a former Florida state investigator, Stranahan knows there are plenty of potential culprits. His long list of enemies includes an off point hit man, a personal injury lawyer of billboard fame, a notoriously irritating TV journalist, and a fumbling plastic surgeon.
When Miranda’s fiancé, Russ, is being vetted for his dream job in the U.S. attorney’s office, the couple joke that Miranda’s parents’ history as antiwar activists in the Sixties might jeopardize Russ’s security clearance. In fact, the real threat emerges when Russ’s future employer discovers that Miranda was arrested for felony kidnapping seven years earlier—an arrest she’d never bothered to tell Russ about.
Miranda tries to explain that she was only helping her best friend, in the midst of a nasty custody battle, take her daughter to visit her parents in Israel. As Miranda struggles to prove that she’s not a criminal, she stumbles into other secrets that will challenge what she thought she knew about her own family, her friend, Russ—and herself.
When Miranda’s fiancé, Russ, is being vetted for his dream job in the U.S. attorney’s office, the couple joke that Miranda’s parents’ history as antiwar activists in the Sixties might jeopardize Russ’s security clearance. In fact, the real threat emerges when Russ’s future employer discovers that Miranda was arrested for felony kidnapping seven years earlier—an arrest she’d never bothered to tell Russ about.
Miranda tries to explain that she was only helping her best friend, in the midst of a nasty custody battle, take her daughter to visit her parents in Israel. As Miranda struggles to prove that she’s not…
