Washoe County Library System

"In 1874, a young boy named Charley Ross was snatched from his front yard in Philadelphia. The child's father received a letter that read: "Mr. Ross: be not uneasy you son charley bruster be all writ. we is got him and no powers on earth can deliver out of our hand. You wil have two pay us before you git him from us, and pay us a big cent to." Philadelphia had just won the bid to host America's centennial celebration. The country had survived revolution,...

Traces the events that surrounded the 1984 murder of a woman and her child by fundamentalist Mormons Ron and Dan Lafferty, exploring the belief systems and traditions, including polygamy, that mark the faith's most extreme factions and what their practices reflect about the nature of religion in America. Reader's Guide available. Jon Krakauer's literary reputation rests on insightful chronicles of lives conducted at the outer limits. In UNDER THE...

"In 1873 the people of Labette County in Kansas made a grisly discovery. Buried on a homestead seven miles south of the town of Cherryvale, in a bloodied cellar and under frost-covered soil, were countless bodies in varying states of decay. The discovery sent the local community and national newspapers into a frenzy that continued for over two decades, and the land on which the crimes took place became known as 'Hells Half-Acre.' When it emerged that...

"Missoula, Montana, is a typical college town, with a highly regarded state university, bucolic surroundings, a lively social scene, and an excellent football team, the Grizzlies, with a rabid fan base. The Department of Justice investigated 350 sexual assaults reported to the Missoula police between January 2008 and May 2012. Few of these assaults were properly handled by either the university or local authorities. In this, Missoula is also typical....

"A riveting true story of a mother who fought back against the drug cartels in Mexico, pursuing her own brand of justice to avenge the kidnapping and murder of her daughter—from a global investigative correspondent for The New York Times “Azam Ahmed has written a page-turning mystery but also a stunning, color-saturated portrait of the collapse of formal justice in one Mexican town.”&#٬٢٠١٤؛Steve Coll, Pulitzer Prize–winning author...

A sweeping narrative history of the events leading to 9/11, a groundbreaking look at the people and ideas, the terrorist plans and the Western intelligence failures that culminated in the assault on America. Lawrence Wright's remarkable book is based on five years of research and hundreds of interviews that he conducted in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Sudan, England, France, Germany, Spain, and the United States. Brilliantly conceived...

Chronicles the decade-long quest to capture Paul Le Roux, who used twenty-first-century technology to create a massive online drug cartel before he struck a deal to turn in his own people. It all started as an online prescription drug network, supplying hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of painkillers to American customers. It would not stop there. Before long, the business had turned into a sprawling multinational conglomerate engaged in almost...

Details the 1990 kidnappings of ten Columbian men and women by Medellin drug boss Pablo Escobar who planned to use the hostages as bargaining chips in negotiations with the government; focusing on the experiences of journalist Maruja Pachon who was held captive for six months.

Of Men and Monsters examines the serial killer as an American cultural icon, one that both attracts and repels. Richard Tithecott suggests that the stories we tell and the images we conjure of serial killers-real and fictional-reveal as much about mainstream culture and its values, desires, and anxieties as they do about the killers themselves.

Two true-crime tales relate the stories of a couple who were tortured and left for dead after a home invasion, and a double homicide in Omaha, Nebraska.