Murder, New England - Paperback

by M. William Phelps (Author)

True tales of murder in New England, from the colonial period to today, chronicled by a true crime master, New York Times bestselling author, and star of Investigation Discovery's new television show Dark Minds

Back Jacket

Best-selling true-crime author M. William Phelps takes readers to his own backyard in eight bloodcurdling murder cases. Think New England is all bucolic landscapes and Robert Frost poems? Think again. In Murder, New England, Phelps explores different motives, themes, and community reactions to horrific crimes, including: The killing of Rebecca Cornwall, a 73-year-old widow who in 1673 was burned to death in front of her bedroom fireplace on an island in Rhode Island's Narragansett Bay.The 1879 case of Holyoke, Massachusetts, millworker John Kemmler, who lost his job and then killed his daughters because he feared they'd be forced into prostitution.Boston, 1931, and the New England Mafia's murderous coming of age. The 2001 case of teenage slackers in Norton, Massachusetts, whose murder of a grandmother was blamed on TV, youth, drugs, sex, money, and rock-n-roll.And the 2008 murder of a young woman out for a jog in Woodstock, Connecticut, attacked by the groundskeeper of an estate owned by the puppeteer who played Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch.

Author Biography

M. William Phelps is the New York Times bestselling, award-winning author of more than twenty nonfiction books, and star of the Investigarion Discovery show, "Dark Minds." Winner of 2008 New England Book Festival Award for I'll Be Watching You, Phelps--in addition to writing his hugely popular contemporary true-crime books--has written for the Providence Journal, Hartford Courant, New London Day, and consulted on the first season of the hit Showtime cable television series "Dexter." He is also the author of The Devil's Rooming House and The Devil's Right Hand (both from Lyons Press).