In cold blood

a true account of a multiple murder and its consequences

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Truman Capote: In cold blood (1965, New American Library)

384 pages

English language

Published Nov. 8, 1965 by New American Library.

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In Cold Blood is a non-fiction novel by American author Truman Capote, first published in 1966. It details the 1959 murders of four members of the Clutter family in the small farming community of Holcomb, Kansas. Capote learned of the quadruple murder before the killers were captured, and he traveled to Kansas to write about the crime. He was accompanied by his childhood friend and fellow author Harper Lee, and they interviewed residents and investigators assigned to the case and took thousands of pages of notes. Killers Richard Hickock and Perry Smith were arrested six weeks after the murders and later executed by the state of Kansas. Capote ultimately spent six years working on the book. In Cold Blood was an instant success and is the second-best-selling true crime book in history, behind Vincent Bugliosi's Helter Skelter (1974) about the Charles Manson murders. Some critics consider Capote's work the original …

49 editions

Subjects

  • Hickock, Richard Eugene, -- 1931-1965.
  • Smith, Peter Edward, -- 1928 or 9-1965.
  • Murder -- Kansas.