89 books like Manson in His Own Words

I recommend this book as often as I can. Edgier and more disturbing than the film adaptation, Heller’s novel offers not one but two women doing terrible things.

Sheba is the art instructor hiding her illicit meetings with a student and running around like a teenager in what must be one of recent literature’s more reprehensible midlife crises. Barbara is the cynical older woman, the veteran teacher with a busy schedule and a barren personal life.

Sheba appeals to Barbara as a friend, to keep her secret. Barbara responds with feigned concern, then with affection, desire, jealousy, and a malicious desire to control Sheba, to jerk her chain and watch her dance. For sheer emotional power dynamics between two women, this book is hard to beat.

Grace Marks was a real Irish-Canadian maid who, in 1840s Ontario, was convicted of murdering her employer. Did she do it? If so, why?

Margaret Atwood uses the lens of interviews with a (fictional) doctor to unpeel Grace’s many layers (or is she only adding lies?). Dreamy, Gothic, and tragic; I loved it. I also loved the miniseries adaptation from Sarah Polley. 

The Cocktail Waitress is the last work of total master James M. Cain, posthumously published in 2014. I started this on a hike and did not stop listening until it was done, netting me quite a bit of cardio. This firsthand explanation of a tabloid murder scandal, as told by its prime suspect, is often hilarious, surprisingly feminist, and darkly sinister. As the titular waitress innocently recalls meeting and marrying a much older millionaire and his baffling demise soon after, it’s clear she’s lying through her teeth. But deducing how and why is the fun of the book. Still, the ending is a gut punch. My book hangover was a solid 72 hours (could’ve been the hike though). 

This. Book. 

Wow. 

I felt changed after I read it and talked about it with everyone who would listen. Not only is this book a riveting, fast-paced read, but it’s an important novel about assault, grooming, and the abuse of power.

The protagonist is an aspiring teenaged singer who gets discovered and then manipulated and abused by a much older celebrity R&B artist. When she wakes up with her hands covered in his blood and finds him dead, she realizes she has no memory of what occurred the night before. This novel was enticing as much as it was heartbreaking.

Best known for Helter Skelter--his classic 1975 true crime memoir on prosecuting the Manson family, former Los Angeles deputy DA Vincent Bugliosi wrote this book later about a complicated but lesser-known double-homicide case he tried in 1966, three years before the Manson murders occurred. As the prosecutor on these cases, Bugliosi boasted access to background details that only an insider can share, merging psychological analysis with trial strategy concerns. Echoing themes of the noir thriller Double Indemnity, this true account unveils the plot of two lovers to murder their respective spouses and explains the complex police work required to catch them.

The third of the five-book Riplead series, Ripley’s Game throws a twist on the traditional cat-and-mouse thriller.

The youthful homoerotic panic of The Talented Mr. Ripley has calmed down, and Tom Ripley is now a married man with a château in France. Trouble begins when he plays a game with his neighbor, Jonathan Trevanny—a man with a terminal illness, desperate to leave money to his wife and child. Ripley sets him up for an offer he can’t refuse: murder for hire.

I find the best facet of the novel to be Ripley’s begrudging humanity. He softens enough to help Jonathan when the job of garroting organized crime thugs is too horrible for him to stomach. While not explicitly gay, the queer vibes are strong as Ripley’s growing tenderness for Jonathan helps to humanize him.

A brilliant hypnotic novel that almost no one read. Albert French was the victim of a publishing nightmare—his editor and his publisher, both of whom had primed his novel for a major publicity push, left for new jobs before the pub date, after which his book was orphaned and abandoned. For anyone not in the book business, it might seem hard to believe that a terrific novel would be left to languish, but, sadly, such an event is not uncommon in American publishing.

Set in an African American section of Pittsburgh in 1950, I Can’t Wait on God evokes both the day-to-day lives of ordinary people and the striving and hopelessness of African Americans trying to escape the doomed existence to which so many are condemned.  French weaves a tale that is starkly realistic, yet with a mystical overtone that creates a sort of intoxicating haze. The narrative seems straightforward,… show more.

This book starts in the same moment as Slayground, but follows Alan Grofield as he flees the scene, instead of Parker.

Grofield is more of a grifter than a straight-out thief, and his roles in the thieving scams tend to reflect that. I love that his true love is acting and him taking scores is simply a means to allow him to pursue that passion.

I enjoy the slightly lighter tone of the Grofield novels, though they are still what I’d call gritty. And I love how Stark created a “Parker-verse” long before the idea of an IP universe was commonplace.

This book grabbed me by the throat and refused to let go.

Jordan Harper does more with suggestion and a few well-crafted sentences than some writers accomplish in an entire novel. When he needs to be brutal, he’s a monster. When he needs to be tender, your eyes sting.

Polly is both a badass and a little girl—I don’t know how Harper pulled that off. And I have never cared so much about a stuffed animal as I have Polly’s teddy bear.

I loved this book because it put me right there in the life, with all the violence, plots, girlfriends, and craziness. Author Nicholas Pileggi is a master of the craft. He drew me in immediately by capturing the voice of Henry Hill; mob associate turned informant.

I learned things I didn’t know–and some things I didn’t want to know–about the life. When I saw Goodfellas, the Martin Scorsese movie based on the book, it all rang true again.