Bound Together 2023: Nonfiction: True Crime
Authors James T. Bartlett, Sarah Weinman, and Kim Cross dissect murders (and murderers) that continue to haunt us.
THE ALASKAN BLONDE: SEX, SECRETS, AND THE HOLLYWOOD STORY THAT SHOCKED AMERICA, By James T. Bartlett
TERRITORY BOOKS • MARCH 2022 • 250 PAGES • $19.99 PAPERBACK
In 1953, Cecil Wells, a powerful Alaskan businessman, was murdered during what his wife, Diane, having suffered injuries herself, claimed was a violent home invasion. Detectives suspected there was more to the story—Diane had allegedly engaged in an extramarital affair—and the case became a national scandal. Writer James T. Bartlett reexamines the unsolved murder, offering new evidence in this perplexing mystery.
SCOUNDREL: THE TRUE STORY OF THE MURDERER WHO CHARMED HIS WAY TO FAME AND FREEDOM, By Sarah Weinman
ECCO • FEBRUARY 2022 • 464 PAGES • $29 HARDCOVER
Edgar Smith, a convicted murderer sentenced to death in the 1960s, secured his freedom with help from William F. Buckley, founder of the conservative magazine National Review, who did not believe that Smith could have committed the crime given that they held the same worldview. Sarah Weinman’s vivid account of Smith begins with his initial deception and charts his explosive rise to fame and involvement in attempted murder following his release. Most crucially, Weinman considers who gets to be declared innocent, within the context of the prison industrial complex and the civil rights movement.
IN LIGHT OF ALL DARKNESS: INSIDE THE POLLY KLAAS KIDNAPPING AND THE SEARCH FOR AMERICA’S CHILD, By Kim Cross
GRAND CENTRAL PUBLISHING • OCTOBER 2023 • 320 PAGES • $32.50 HARDCOVER
Thirty years ago in Petaluma, California, a girl named Polly Klaas was kidnapped while having a slumber party. Her mom was there when it happened, asleep in a nearby room. Polly was 12 years old. Author Kim Cross lays out details from important files, intimate stories told by investigators of the case and people close to the victim, an account of the 65-day search, what happened to the kidnapper, and more in this comprehensive true-crime tale.
