Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7758 in Books
• Published on: 1998-09-03
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Synopsis
Agent Al Dewey has a crime to solve - the slaughter of an entire family of god-fearing farming folk. All Agent Dewey has are two footprints, four dead bodies and a whole lot of questions, none with easy answers.

Customer Reviews

Beautiful and horrifying
This book is horrifying in its subject matter and as such I felt almost guilty to be reading it. Should I be reading for recreation something so real and horrific, about real suffering. On the other hand the prose is utterly fabulous, the writing completely compelling, and the characterisations utterly believeable. In some ways it felt like Lolita and American Psycho, admittedly those were works of fiction, but I had the same feeling of guilt to be reading something so well written about something so awful.

This is just such an American book, in the sheer power and momentum of the writing. It is also a direct descendent of Steinbeck, and is unfortunately an ancestor of some of the more grisly (although vastly lesser) contemporary US crime fiction.

Recommended, but not for the faint of heart.

Horrifyingly magnificent.
'In Cold Blood' is one of the best books of all time. It should be required reading in all beginning college lit courses, if not in high school. I first read 'In Cold Blood' as a junior in high school (in the 80s), and I read it in one sitting- straight through the night- just because I couldn't put it down. I have recently purchased this newer edition, because this book is worth reading again.

To begin with, Truman Capote, for all his notoriety, was an incredible writer, and this book is one of his finest. The gritty and depressing existence of Dick and Perry that leads up to one horrific night in Kansas is so vividly represented, you feel all the more frightened as you are reading it, because it seems you have become witness to the absolute terror and brutality perpetrated on an innocent family by these two men. Truman Capote not only presents in graphic detail the horrors of this night, but he also reveals the personalities of Dick and Perry in such a way that, even though they are despicable human beings, you may feel a twinge of sorrow for them. The birth of each man's anger, and the inability of either one of them to integrate into society, was formed in childhoods of abuse. It truly is amazing how Capote got inside the heads of these pathetic men, capturing the pervasive sadness and despair, bizarrely coupled with hope for a "normal" future. The relationship of Dick and Perry is almost a symbiotic one. Separately, they may not have done what they did, but together, they are lethal. The gullibility of a person, who never felt like he belonged, combined with another person who thinks he needs to exact revenge on society- it's a sick combination of pack mentality and ignorance. Eventually, all of this culminates into a night of terror in Kansas wrought by these two men. The portrayal is so graphic in nature; no one could read it without being rendered silently stunned by the horror of it all. The sadness felt for this totally unsuspecting and wholly innocent family is overwhelming. Certainly there have been similar crimes, but the representation of it by Capote, and the intrinsic knowledge of these two men, makes you feel you had a front row view of the whole thing.

`In Cold Blood' is less about the particulars of that awful crime one horrific night in Kansas; it is more about the insidiousness of what childhood abuse and feeling disenfranchised can do to a person. It would be easy to focus on the horror and sadness of this massacre, but the brilliance of Capote is that the focus is placed on the murderers and trying to engender compassion from the reader for them. With Capote's vision in writing, he almost gets us there. After the capture and imprisonment of these two men, you can physically feel the fear in their hearts for their own condemnation. Perry's fear of execution is especially haunting. This book is a must read for anyone who likes to read and makes no difference that it was written 40 years ago. It transcends all genres, because even though the story is horrific, the writing is phenomenal, and you will NEVER forget it.

Almost 50 years on: still a classic

Never salacious, mawkish or exploitative, this ground breaking book remains a true crime classic. Capote's ability to weave a compelling narrative, his eye for the telling detail and wonderful prose never fail.