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A Pickpocket's Tale: The Underworld of Nineteenth-Century New York
Timothy J. Gilfoyle · back to the book
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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorCareless People: Murder, Mayhem, and the Invention of The Great Gatsby
Sarah Churchwell · 432 pages
" Tracing the genesis of a masterpiece, a Fitzgerald scholar follows the novelist as he begins work on The Great Gatsby. The autumn of 1922 found F. Scott Fitzgerald at the height of his fame, days from turning twenty-six years old, and returning to New York for the publication of his fourth book, Tales of the Jazz Age. A spokesman for America's carefree younger generation, Fitzgerald found a home
The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe, and the Invention of Murder
Daniel Stashower · 331 pages
On July 28, 1841, the body of Mary Rogers, a twenty-year-old cigar girl, was found floating in the Hudson-and New York's unregulated police force proved incapable of solving the crime. One year later, a struggling writer named Edgar Allan Poe decided to take on the case-and sent his fictional detective, C. Auguste Dupin, to solve the baffling murder of Mary Rogers in "The Mystery of Marie Rogt."
American Eve: Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White, the Birth of the "It" Girl and the Crime of the Century
Paula Uruburu · 400 pages
Mrs. Sherlock Holmes
Brad Ricca · 436 pages
Presents the true story of the first female U.S. District Attorney and traveling detective who found missing eighteen-year-old Ruth Cruger when the entire NYPD had given up. "In 1917, on the day before Valentine's Day, eighteen-year-old Ruth Cruger disappeared. When the police gave up, a mysterious woman in black vowed to find her. Mrs. Sherlock Holmes tells the true story of Grace Humiston, the
Thunderstruck
Erik Larson · 480 pages
A true story of love, murder, and the end of the world's "great hush." In Thunderstruck, Erik Larson tells the interwoven stories of two men--Hawley Crippen, a very unlikely murderer, and Guglielmo Marconi, the obsessive creator of a seemingly supernatural means of communication--whose lives intersect during one of the greatest criminal chases of all time.Set in Edwardian London and on the stormy
The Man Who Invented Motion Pictures: A True Tale of Obsession, Murder, and the Movies
Paul Fischer · 416 pages
The Napoleon of Crime: The Life and Times of Adam Worth, Master Thief
Ben Macintyre · 320 pages
The Victorian era's most infamous thief, Adam Worth was the original Napoleon of crime. Worth learned early that the best way to succeed was to steal. And steal he did. Following a strict code of honor, Worth won the respect of Victorian society. He also aroused its fear by becoming a chilling phantom, mingling undetected with the upper classes, whose valuables he brazenly stole. His most celebrat
Little Man: Meyer Lansky and the Gangster Life
Robert Lacey · 547 pages
The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary
Simon Winchester · 265 pages
Infamous Lady: The True Story of Countess Erzsébet Báthory
Kimberly L. Craft · 379 pages
Reputed to be the world's worst female serial killer, Countess Bathory is also said to have been a lesbian, a vampire, and a witch who bathed in the blood of the 650 people she murdered before being walled alive in the tower of her castle. The truth, however, is finally revealed through actual letters, documents, and trial transcripts, many of which have been translated into English for the first
Newton and the Counterfeiter: The Unknown Detective Career of the World's Greatest Scientist
Thomas Levenson · 318 pages
Already famous throughout Europe for his theories of planetary motion and gravity, Isaac Newton decided to take on the job of running the Royal Mint. This is a compelling book about crime, science and money, and transforms our image of Britain's greatest scientist.
The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York
Deborah Blum · 327 pages
The untold story of how poison rocked Jazz Age New York City. A pair of forensic scientists began their trailblazing chemical detective work, fighting to end an era when untraceable poisons offered an easy path to the perfect crime. Chief medical examiner Charles Norris and toxicologist Alexander Gettler investigate a family mysteriously stricken bald, factory workers with crumbling bones, a diner
Wiseguy
Nicholas Pileggi · 308 pages
Presents a firsthand account of organized crime showing it's brutality and fascination.
Get Capone: The Secret Plot That Captured America's Most Wanted Gangster
Jonathan Eig · 474 pages
Drawing on thousands of pages of recently discovered government documents, wiretap transcripts, and Al Capone's handwritten personal letters, "New York Times" bestselling author Jonathan Eig tells the dramatic story of the rise and fall of the nation's most notorious criminal in rich new detail.
Mary Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley
Alison Weir · 621 pages
This book is an excursion into Britain's bloodstained, power-obsessed past. The author's investigation into Lord Darnley's murder is set against one of the most dramatic periods in English history. Its conclusions shed light on the actions and motives of the conspirators and, in particular, the extent of Mary's own involvement. Tall, handsome, accomplished, and charming, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley
The Savage City: Race, Murder, and a Generation on the Edge
T.J. English · 474 pages
The safest big city in America? That would be the question a certain generation of New Yorkers would ask someone who praises New York for it's safety and prosperity. A generation that has experienced living in this city at a time that could only be described as a nightmare.
The League of Lady Poisoners: Illustrated True Stories of Dangerous Women
Lisa Perrin · 208 pages
Hellhound on His Trail: The Stalking of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the International Hunt for His Assassin
Hampton Sides · 480 pages
From the acclaimed bestselling author of Ghost Soldiers and Blood and Thunder, a taut, intense narrative about the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the largest manhunt in American history. On April 23, 1967, Prisoner #416J, an inmate at the notorious Missouri State Penitentiary, escaped in a breadbox. Fashioning himself Eric Galt, this nondescript thief and con man--whose real name wa
Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever
Bill O'Reilly, Martin Dugard · 324 pages
This book is a riveting historical narrative of the heart-stopping events surrounding the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, and the first work of history from mega-bestselling author Bill O'Reilly. The anchor of The O'Reilly Factor recounts one of the most dramatic stories in American history -- how one gunshot changed the country forever. In the spring of 1865, the bloody saga of America's Civil
Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery
Norman Mailer · 791 pages
"MARVELOUS . . . BREATHTAKING."--The New York Times Book Review"MAILER SHINES . . . Explaining Kennedy's assassination through the flaws in Oswald's character has been attempted before, notably by Gerald Posner in Case Closed and Don Delillo in Libra. But neither handled Oswald with the kind of dexterity and literary imagination that Mailer here supplies in great force. . . . Oswald's Tale weaves
The Murder of the Century: The Gilded Age Crime that Scandalized a City and Sparked the Tabloid Wars
Paul Collins · 325 pages
On Long Island, a farmer finds a duck pond turned red with blood. On the Lower East Side, two boys playing at a pier discover a floating human torso wrapped tightly in oilcloth. Blueberry pickers near Harlem stumble upon neatly severed limbs in an overgrown ditch. Clues to a horrifying crime are turning up all over New York, but the police are baffled: There are no witnesses, no motives, no suspec
Bloody Crimes: The Funeral of Abraham Lincoln and the Chase for Jefferson Davis
James L. Swanson
On the morning of April 2, 1865, Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, received a telegram from General Robert E. Lee. There is no more time. The Yankees are coming, it warned. Shortly before midnight, Davis boarded a train from Richmond and fled the capital, setting off an intense and thrilling chase in which Union cavalry hunted the Confederate president. Two weeks later, President Linc