John Ferak

A native of Joliet and Plainfield, Illinois, John Ferak chronicled the awful tragedy in rural Murdock while serving as an investigative journalist from 2003-2012 for the Omaha World-Herald, Nebraska's largest news organization. Ferak appeared on Investigation Discovery's "Cold Blood."

These days, Ferak is an award-winning investigative team member for Gannett Wisconsin Media, based at The Post-Crescent in Appleton, Wis. He also has worked as a reporter or editor at the South Bend Tribune in Indiana, The Daily Herald based in Arlington Heights Ill., and the Green Bay Press-Gazette.

Although Ferak takes his writing and journalism seriously, he enjoys spending his free time with his wife, Andrea, and their three children. Ferak roots for the Gre

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Thomas Thompson

He was born in Texas and graduated from the University of Texas in 1955. He then worked as a reporter and editor at the Houston Press.

Thompson joined Life Magazine in 1961 and became an editor and staff writer. While at Life he covered the JFK assassination and was the first writer to locate Lee Harvey Oswald's home and wife. Among his stories were coverage of the making of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles, in which he revealed the group's extensive drug use; an in-depth look at Frank Sinatra and his alleged Mafia ties; and the 40th and 50th birthdays of Elizabeth Taylor.

His book Hearts (1971) concerned the rivalry between Houston surgeons Michael DeBakey and Denton Cooley at the dawn of the heart transplant era. Richie:
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Frank Cullotta

Starting as a tough kid and thief on the streets of Chicago, he went on to become a trusted lieutenant in Tony Spilotro's gang of organized lawbreakers in Las Vegas.

Cullotta's world was one of high-profile heists, street muscle and information-lots of it-about many of the FBI's most wanted. In the end, that information was his ticket out of crime, as he turned government witness and became one of a handful of mob insiders to enter the Witness Protection Program.

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Gary L. Stewart

Gary L. Stewart earned his bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering from Louisiana State University and is vice president of Delta Tech Service of Louisiana. Ten years ago, Gary began writing a journal, chronicling every detail of his search for his father and his own identity. That journal served as the basis for The Most Dangerous Animal of All. Gary resides in Louisiana with his wife, Kristy, and son, Zach.

Source: Harper Collins.
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Leslie Ghiglieri

A devoted reader of classics and nonfiction, Leslie was initially employed as a 911 dispatcher in California where she was immediately addicted to the unpredictability of police work. After moving to Oregon, she joined the Josephine County sheriffs department working in the dispatch and warrants division. After three years, Leslie accepted a position as a field representative for a criminal justice computer system overseeing the needs of 17 agencies in Southern Oregon. Now retired, interest in reading, law-enforcement work, and recreational writing, resulted in Leslie fulfilling the wish of a friend who asked her to document the story of her husband’s murder. This book, The Decision to Kill, not only tells readers intimate details of the cr
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Michael Griesbach

Michael Griesbach is a veteran prosecutor in the state of Wisconsin where the events recounted in his books occurred. He wrote The Innocent Killer as a gripping true crime novel, but also as a challenge to the system. He hopes to leave readers better informed about the inner workings of the criminal justice system and more concerned about those whose lives it deeply affects. He lives in northeastern Wisconsin with his wife Jody and their four children.
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Steve Jackson

“He writes with both muscle and heart”—New York Times bestselling author Gregg Olsen

New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist Steve Jackson has written ten non-fiction books in true crime, history and biography genres; he has also written fourteen crime fiction thrillers for the long-running and Times bestselling "Butch Karp Series" in collaboration with former New York assistant district attorney Robert K. Tanenbaum.

He is currently in the process of writing three more contracted non-fiction books: ALL SECURE (Hachette), FINDING ANASTASIA (Potomac) and SAVING ANNIE (WildBlue Press), as well as working on a sequel to his bestseller NO STONE UNTURNED. He is also finishing a novel, ISLAND OF WOMEN. The publishers of his p
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Darcy O'Brien

Darcy O'Brien was born in Los Angeles, the son of Hollywood silent film actor George O’Brien and actress Marguerite Churchill.

O'Brien attended Princeton University and University of Cambridge, and received a master's degree and doctorate from the University of California, Berkely. From 1965 to 1978 he was a professor of English at Pomona College. In 1978 he moved to Tulsa, and taught at the Univesity of Tulsa until 1995.

O'Brien was married three times and had one daughter named Molly O'Brien.

O'Brien died of a heart attack in Tulsa on March 2, 1998.
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E.S. Silversmith

Long since retired from her days moonlighting as an entertainer, E. can be found in the sleepy pine forests of the Pacific Northwest. When she isn’t working her dream job in the medical field, E. spends her time gardening, playing Magic the Gathering, and enjoying the peaceful solitude of the damp, mossy woods.
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Peter Lance

Peter Lance is a five-time Emmy-winning investigative reporter now working as a screenwriter and novelist. With a Masters Degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a J.D. from Fordham University School of Law, Lance spent the first 15 years of his career as a print reporter and network correspondent.

He began his career as a reporter for his hometown paper, The Newport, R.I. Daily News. There, while a student at Northeastern University in Boston, he won the coveted Sevellon Brown Award from the A.P. Managing Editors Association. Lance next moved to WNET, the PBS flagship in New York, where he won his first New York area Emmy and the Ohio State Award as a producer- reporter for Channel 13′s news magazine THE 51ST STATE
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Thomas H. Cook

There is more than one author with this name on Goodreads.

Thomas H. Cook has been praised by critics for his attention to psychology and the lyrical nature of his prose. He is the author of more than 30 critically-acclaimed fiction books, including works of true crime. Cook published his first novel, Blood Innocents, in 1980. Cook published steadily through the 1980s, penning such works as the Frank Clemons trilogy, a series of mysteries starring a jaded cop.

He found breakout success with The Chatham School Affair (1996), which won an Edgar Award for best novel. Besides mysteries, Cook has written two true-crime books including the Edgar-nominated Blood Echoes (1993). He lives and works in New York City.

Awards
Edgar Allan Poe – Best Novel –
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Tomás Guillén

Tomás Guillén is a Professor Emeritus at Seattle University.

He previously worked as a journalist at The Seattle Times, Omaha World-Herald, and the Tucson Citizen. In 1988 he and a colleague were Pulitzer Prize finalists for their articles on the Green River Killer.

Guillén received his Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from the University of Arizona and his Masters of Arts in Communication from the University of Washington.

Guillén and his wife live in Santa Fe, New Mexico and have three adult children: Natalie, Phillip and Anne.

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Ken Englade

Kenneth F. Englade is a New Mexico-based author who has published nine books dealing with high profile trials. His latest book, Meltdown in Haditha: The Killing of 24 Iraqi Civilians by U.S. Marines and the Failure of Military Justice, will be published in 2015 by McFarland & Co. He also published five historical novels dealing with the pre-Civil War West. His books have been published in Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and Canada. He is a veteran journalist who has worked on newspapers and for fourteen years with United Press International, including three years in Asia where he covered the Vietnam War and the fall of Saigon. Beyond Reason, his book about a University of Virginia coed and her German boyfriend who conspired to kill the
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Joe Sharkey

Joe Sharkey’s work appears in major national and international publications. For 19 years, until 2015, he was a columnist for the New York Times — for 16 years doing the weekly “On the Road” column on business travel, and before that the weekly “Jersey” column for three years. He is currently a columnist with Business Jet Traveler magazine, and an adjunct professor of journalism at the University of Arizona.

A Vietnam veteran, he has written five books, four non-fiction and a novel. One of his nonfiction books, “Above Suspicion,” has been adapted as a major motion picture starring Emilia Clarke, Jack Huston, Thora Birch and Johnny Knoxville (and directed by Phillip Noyce), to be released soon.

In January 2017, a new, revised edition of his bo
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Anthony Flacco

Anthony’s background as a trained stage actor with over 2,000 performances under his Actors Equity membership provides the primary basis for his critically acclaimed ability to empathize with a wide cross-section of personalities. His screenwriting experience is also of great use in telling narrative stories that are visually compelling, whether for the “screen” of a reader’s imagination or the screen of a theatre or at home.

He was selected for the prestigious American Film Institute fellowship in Screenwriting, and received his MFA in writing there in 1990 after winning AFI’s Paramount Studios Fellowship Award for his script, The Frog's Legacy. He was then selected out of 2,000 entrants for the Walt Disney Studios Screenwriting Fellowship,
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Darcy O'Brien

Darcy O'Brien was born in Los Angeles, the son of Hollywood silent film actor George O’Brien and actress Marguerite Churchill.

O'Brien attended Princeton University and University of Cambridge, and received a master's degree and doctorate from the University of California, Berkely. From 1965 to 1978 he was a professor of English at Pomona College. In 1978 he moved to Tulsa, and taught at the Univesity of Tulsa until 1995.

O'Brien was married three times and had one daughter named Molly O'Brien.

O'Brien died of a heart attack in Tulsa on March 2, 1998.
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Caitlin Rother

New York Times bestselling author Caitlin Rother has written or co-authored 14 books, ranging from narrative non-fiction crime to mystery and memoir. Her newest book is DEATH ON OCEAN BOULEVARD: Inside the Coronado Mansion Case (April 27, 2021). Her backlist includes HUNTING CHARLES MANSON; SECRETS, LIES, AND SHOELACES; LOVE GONE WRONG; DEAD RECKONING; THEN NO ONE CAN HAVE HER; I'LL TAKE CARE OF YOU; NAKED ADDICTION; POISONED LOVE; BODY PARTS; TWISTED TRIANGLE; LOST GIRLS; WHERE HOPE BEGINS and MY LIFE, DELETED. A Pulitzer Prize nominee, Rother worked as an investigative reporter at daily newspapers for 19 years before quitting the news biz in 2006 to write books full-time. Her journalism has been published in Cosmopolitan, the Los Angeles
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Steve Jackson

“He writes with both muscle and heart”—New York Times bestselling author Gregg Olsen

New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist Steve Jackson has written ten non-fiction books in true crime, history and biography genres; he has also written fourteen crime fiction thrillers for the long-running and Times bestselling "Butch Karp Series" in collaboration with former New York assistant district attorney Robert K. Tanenbaum.

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Shaun Attwood

In prison, I read over 1000 books in just under six years, including many literary classics. Books were the lifeblood of my rehabilitation.

As told on National Geographic Channel's Locked-Up/Banged-Up Abroad episode "Raving Arizona," I used a tiny pencil sharpened on a cell door to write the first prison blog, Jon’s Jail Journal. My writing, smuggled out of the jail with the highest rate of death in America, run by Sheriff Joe Arpaio, turned the international media spotlight on the human rights violations, including guards murdering mentally ill inmates, dead rats in the food, lack of medical care...

Raised in a small chemical-manufacturing town in northern England, I was the first from my family to go to university. As a penniless graduate,
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Shanna Hogan

A New York Times bestselling American non-fiction author and journalist. She was best known for writing the book Picture Perfect about convicted killer Jodi Arias.

In 2005, Hogan graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism from Arizona State University.

Hogan was awarded the 2009 Arizona Press Club's Virg Hill Journalist of the Year.[9] She was also awarded "Journalist of the Year 2011" by the Arizona Newspaper Association.

Hogan lived in Phoenix, Arizona with her husband, Matt LaRussa, and son Zander.
She was an adjunct professor at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University.

She died September 1, 2020 after being found unresponsive in her swimming pool after a fall.
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Rod Kackley

I quit my job to write. That’s how much love writing. It’s also an indication of how utterly frustrated I was with my life as a middle manager in a national corporation. Mid-life crisis? No, I don’t think so. It’s more that I saw the finish line approaching more rapidly than I expected thirty years before.

What I am is what I write.

The characters in the St. Isidore Collection, the people who live in this town I have created in my mind, all contain some thread of me. Let’s be honest. I write what I know. And I know the frustration of listening to the millennials at work talk about their plans for the next thirty years, and suddenly realizing I don’t have thirty years left.

For Henry Branson, the protagonist in the short story, Revenge is Best
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Ken Kratz

Ken Kratz is a lawyer and the former district attorney of Calumet County, Wisconsin. He gained prominence for trying the highly publicized homicide case, State of Wisconsin v. Steven Avery (2007), in which Avery and his nephew Brendan Dassey were both convicted.
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Leslie Ghiglieri

A devoted reader of classics and nonfiction, Leslie was initially employed as a 911 dispatcher in California where she was immediately addicted to the unpredictability of police work. After moving to Oregon, she joined the Josephine County sheriffs department working in the dispatch and warrants division. After three years, Leslie accepted a position as a field representative for a criminal justice computer system overseeing the needs of 17 agencies in Southern Oregon. Now retired, interest in reading, law-enforcement work, and recreational writing, resulted in Leslie fulfilling the wish of a friend who asked her to document the story of her husband’s murder. This book, The Decision to Kill, not only tells readers intimate details of the cr
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E.S. Silversmith

Long since retired from her days moonlighting as an entertainer, E. can be found in the sleepy pine forests of the Pacific Northwest. When she isn’t working her dream job in the medical field, E. spends her time gardening, playing Magic the Gathering, and enjoying the peaceful solitude of the damp, mossy woods.
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Mark Sebastian Jordan

Mark Sebastian Jordan has worn many hats in his day: radio DJ, businessman, actor, innkeeper, playwright, museum docent, theatrical director, improv comedian, reporter, composer, convenience store clerk, music critic, TV ghost expert, historian, and storyteller. But before all these things, the thread running through his life has always been poetry. He knew for sure that he was a poet when he read Walt Whitman's Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking at age 14 and found himself at one with the boy in the poem, the "singer of a thousand songs" abruptly thrust into a life of creativity by his first understanding of sorrow and loss. Despite a few tries, he has not been able to stop writing poetry ever since. He lives in the rural central highland
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Ken Kratz

Ken Kratz is a lawyer and the former district attorney of Calumet County, Wisconsin. He gained prominence for trying the highly publicized homicide case, State of Wisconsin v. Steven Avery (2007), in which Avery and his nephew Brendan Dassey were both convicted.
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Cliff Yates

Goodreads author Cliff Yates
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