I don't know why but I have always been drawn to crime stories.
The first time the hook caught was with the Puzo's Godfather.
Then Pileggi's Wiseguy (later to become Goodfellas) proved this was not a one-off.
Years later I was dunked again into the baptismal pool, seriously so, by Drieser's An American Tragedy.
After that, I was on a perpetual hunt.
Though, there are limits. I'm not man enough for the likes of Capote's In Cold Blood, or Bugliosi's Helter Skelter or McCarthy's Blood Meridian.
Were it not for these built-in safe-guards, I and others might worry.
I know part of the appeal resides in the oft proven adage—you can't make this stuff up.
Below you will find my personal crib-sheet, tracking a few of the more intriguing crime-centric stories I've happened upon.
I collect them here for my own record, to assist others with a similar bent, and to welcome you to share any memorable ones you know of that I don't.
Fiction
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The Godfather
By Mario Puzo
Publisher Note:
With its brilliant and brutal portrayal of the Corleone family, The Godfather burned its way into our national consciousness. This unforgettable saga of crime and corruption, passion and loyalty continues to stand the test of time, as the definitive novel of the Mafia underworld.
Troy Note:
Like many books, this text offers insights not found in the film, including, rather unexpectedly, a cosmetic vaginal surgery.
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American Tragegy
By Theodor Dreiser
Publisher Note:
The naturalist author Theodore Dreiser was obsessed with true crime, keeping track of articles and cases in the early 20th century. The product of this obsession was his 1925 novel, 'An American Tragedy,' based on a true crime story from New York's Adirondack Mountains region that Dreiser followed.
Troy Note:
For a variety of reasons, I have brought numerous rooms to conversational standstills but after confessing to being able to relate to and sympathize with the lead character in Dreiser's work to a small group of people familiar with the text, I silenced a room with a new level of uncomfortability.
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The Hamlet (Snopes Trilogy)
By William Faulkner
Publisher Note:
The Hamlet, the first novel of Faulkner's Snopes trilogy, is both an ironic take on classical tragedy and a mordant commentary on the grand pretensions of the antebellum South and the depths of its decay in the aftermath of war and Reconstruction. It tells of the advent and the rise of the Snopes family in Frenchman's Bend, a small town built on the ruins of a once-stately plantation. Flem Snopes -- wily, energetic, a man of shady origins -- quickly comes to dominate the town and its people with his cunning and guile.
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The Murderers
By Frederick Brown
Publisher Note:
A struggling actor, Willy Griff keeps himself entertained with the wife of a business mogul, but he wants more: He also wants the business mogul’s money. The mistress, Doris, likes the idea even more than Willy does, and figures if she helps plan the murder, she can ditch the husband and keep the cash.
It’s a dangerous scheme for two low-level, aspiring criminals. But Willy comes up with an ingenious, foolproof plot for pulling it off.
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Non-Fiction
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Wiseguy
By Nicolas Pileggi
Publisher Note:
Nicholas Pileggi’s vivid, unvarnished, journalistic chronicle of the life of Henry Hill—the working-class Brooklyn kid who knew from age twelve that “to be a wiseguy was to own the world,” who grew up to live the highs and lows of the mafia gangster’s life—has been hailed as “the best book ever written on organized crime” (Cosmopolitan).
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American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road
By Nick Bilton
Publisher Note:
In 2011, a twenty-six-year-old libertarian programmer named Ross Ulbricht launched the ultimate free market: the Silk Road, a clandestine Web site hosted on the Dark Web where anyone could trade anything—drugs, hacking software, forged passports, counterfeit cash, poisons—free of the government’s watchful eye.
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Dead Run: The Murder of a Lawman and the Greatest Manhunt of the Modern American West
By Dan Schultz
Publisher Note:
Dead Run is the first in-depth account of this sensational case, replete with overbearing local sheriffs, Native American trackers, posses on horseback, suspicion of vigilante justice and police cover-ups, and the blunders of the nation's most exalted crime-fighters pursuing outlaws into territory in which only they could survive.
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American Desperado: My Life - From Mafia Soldier to Cocaine Cowboy to Secret Government Asset
By Jon Roberts , Evan Wright
Publisher Note:
American Desperado is Roberts’ no-holds-barred account of being born into Mafia royalty, witnessing his first murder at the age of seven, becoming a hunter-assassin in Vietnam, returning to New York to become--at age 22--one of the city’s leading nightclub impresarios, then journeying to Miami where in a few short years he would rise to become the Medellin Cartel’s most effective smuggler.
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Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators
By Ronan Farrow
Publisher Note:
In 2017, a routine network television investigation led to a story only whispered about: one of Hollywood's most powerful producers was a predator, protected by fear, wealth, and a conspiracy of silence. As Farrow drew closer to the truth, shadowy operatives, from high-priced lawyers to elite war-hardened spies, mounted a secret campaign of intimidation, threatening his career, following his every move, and weaponizing an account of abuse in his own family.
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Troublemaker: Surviving Hollywood and Scientology
By Leah Remini
Publisher Note:
An eye-opening memoir about life in the Church of Scientology made by Remini after she loudly and publicly broke with the Church of Scientology. Now, in this frank, funny, poignant memoir, the former King of Queens star opens up about that experience for the first time, revealing the in-depth details of her painful split with the church and its controversial practices.
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Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup
By John Carreyrou
Publisher Note:
In 2014, Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes was widely seen as the next Steve Jobs: a brilliant Stanford dropout whose startup “unicorn” promised to revolutionize the medical industry with its breakthrough device, which performed the whole range of laboratory tests from a single drop of blood. There was just one problem: The technology didn’t work.
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Podcast
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S-Town
Publisher Note:
John despises his Alabama town and decides to do something about it. He asks a reporter to investigate the son of a wealthy family who’s allegedly been bragging that he got away with murder. But then someone else ends up dead, sparking a nasty feud, a hunt for hidden treasure, and an unearthing of the mysteries of one man’s life.
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Murder in Oregon
Publisher Note:
In January of 1989 the director of Oregon’s Department of Corrections, Michael Francke, was brutally stabbed to death outside his office. The murder was quickly pinned on a low-level drug dealer named Frank Gable, a man who Francke's own brother, Kevin, along with storied Oregon reporter Phil Stanford, believe has been wrongfully imprisoned for nearly 30 years.
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The Piketon Massacre
Publisher Note:
The most notorious mass murder in Ohio’s history happened on the night of April 21, 2016 in rural Pike County. Four crime scenes, thirty-two gunshot wounds, eight members of the Rhoden family left dead in their homes.
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Dirty John
Publisher Note:
Debra Newell is a successful interior designer. She meets John Meehan, a handsome man who seems to check all the boxes: attentive, available, just back from a year in Iraq with Doctors Without Borders. But her family doesn’t like John, and they get entangled in an increasingly complex web of love, deception, forgiveness, denial, and ultimately, survival.
Troy Note:
This show has one of the greatest endings imaginable. It takes a bit to get there but when you do, if it hits you like it hit me, you will be audibly screaming out in astonishment.
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The Thing About Pam
Publisher Note:
Two days after Christmas Russ Faria found his wife dead. Her brutal murder set off a chain of events that would leave another person dead and expose a diabolical scheme.
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Escaping NXIVM
Publisher Note:
NXIVM (pronounced 'Nexium') calls itself a humanitarian community. Experts call it a cult. Uncover: Escaping NXIVM is an investigative podcast series about the group, its leader Keith Raniere and one woman's journey to get out.
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In the Red Clay
Publisher Note:
Buried deep in the past of a quiet southern town lies the legend of Billy Sunday Birt, the most dangerous man in Georgia history. A chance meeting one spring day unravels the truth behind the notorious figure and uncovers new secrets along the way.
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Hardcore History
Publisher Note:
Not criminal behavior in the classical sense but lots of criminal actions in our world's past. Hosted by a serious history fanatic, Carlin takes you deep, and I mean deep, into all sorts of history by someone just super interested in the subjects. In example, his discussion on WWII's South Pacific theatre is twenty hours long and begins with the shogun warriors of Japan. It is not possible to leave one of his features feeling deprived.
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