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Good factual/history books about fairly grizzly subjects

Started by iamcoop, February 15, 2018, 04:41:24 PM

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Ignatius_S

Quote from: Hobo With A Shit Pun on February 16, 2018, 02:04:08 PM
Erik Larson's The Devil In The White City tells the story both of the Chicago World's fair of 1893 and the serial killer H H Holmes, as interwoven popcultural events. Strangely, it's from the former strand that I came away with prized facts that I remember: That they held a competition to beat the Eiffel tower, and Eiffel entered with the design of an even bigger tower (losing out to Mr Ferris, and his wheel), and that the musical cue for "vaguely middle-east/North African" that goes "da da da da da, da da da-da da-da da" (y'know, that one) was composed for the Algerian Village exhibit.

Aye, it's a great read. Specifically about Holmes, Adam Selzer's book is work a look – although not as readable – it illustrates where and how the stories about Holmes grew and does a good job in dispelling many of the myths.

The Hate Factory covers the 1980 New Mexico prison riot in a relatively detailed and gory fashion. Worth watching the BBC documentary as well just to fully make yourself an expert on the subject. The bit about when some of the more unhinged prisoners get their hands on some oxy acetylene torches will certainly tick the boxes for your requirements.

https://youtu.be/3M-hPpuAqwQ

Jerzy Bondov

Quote from: Keebleman on February 15, 2018, 11:42:27 PM
And then there's Eric Jager's The Last Duel which tells the story of the last ever judicial duel in France.  It took place in the 14th century but the historical record is remarkably well preserved.  One knight accused another of raping his wife; the accusation was denied.  The two men were to fight to the death, God would ensure that the righteous party would be victorious.  Just to make the stakes that little bit higher, if the accusing knight were to lose, his wife, as she had sworn that the accusation of rape was true, would be burnt at the stake for perjury.

Scorsese has the rights to the book and you can see why it would appeal, because not only is the story innately dramatic to the highest degree, but the description of the duel is incredibly detailed, extremely gory and - to make it even better from a cinematic point of view - even though there were literally thousands of spectators, they were ordered under pain of death to be silent while the fight was in progress.
Thank you for this, I've just finished reading it and was absolutely shitting myself during the duel. Incredibly tense.

Jerzy Bondov

Quote from: Keebleman on February 15, 2018, 11:32:22 PM
Batavia's Graveyard by Mike Dash.  An account of the aftermath of a sixteenth century shipwreck in the Indian Ocean, where the man who assumed responsibility for - and command of - the two hundred or so survivors who had washed up on a few small islands instigated a regime of such hideous, random and almost entirely gratuitous brutality against men, women and children that it's surprising the story isn't better known.  (It may well be in Holland, as it was a Dutch ship.)
Just read this as well, Christ. Mad stuff.

Famous Mortimer

Quote from: newbridge on February 17, 2018, 06:22:32 PM
The 900 Days: The Siege of Leningrad by Salisbury is a great account of what is reasonably described in its blurb as "one of the most gruesome episodes of World War II." The Nazis blockaded Leningrad for nearly 900 days and starved most of the population to death, resulting in a few million deaths from starvation or bombardment, reports of cannibalism, and generally a fun time for all. There may be better books about it, this one is pretty old, but it was good when I read it.

From Wikipedia, an NKVD report from the time outlines "thirteen cases which range from a mother smothering her eighteen-month-old to feed her three older children to a plumber killing his wife to feed his sons and nieces."
Anna Reid's book has a slightly better series of reviews, but both of them seem fascinating.

Also, thumbs up to "Lords of Chaos", which I've not read in forever, but I remember being grimly fascinated by (despite not having the slightest interest in the music).


Keebleman

Quote from: LORD BAD VIBE on March 15, 2018, 03:19:26 PM


Handsome Brute: The True Story of a Ladykiller.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Handsome-Brute-True-Story-Ladykiller/dp/1471101347/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

Haven't read this yet but really want to.  Heath was a perverted bastard of Bundy proportions, but unlike Bundy there are - possible - glimpses of someone who truly understood how evil his behaviour was, that it must be stopped and that he must pay for it.

Of his two victims, the killing of Doreen Marshall is desperately sad.  In photos she looks happy, pretty and so very alive.  They are pictures you would expect to find among the private possessions of a fit old lady of nearly 90 who is still up for occasionally looking after the great-grandkids for an afternoon or two.  The accounts of her last hour or so, when it seems she had begun to realise just how twisted the handsome young officer who had been wining and dining her was and yet could see no way, other than by causing a scene, to avoid having him walk her back to her hotel, are heartbreaking to read.

His first victim is usually described as a masochist who knew she was putting herself in mortal danger by going with Heath to his room, but apparently this new book suggests that this isn't the case and that, like Doreen Marshall, she only became aware of Heath's frenzied sadism when it was far too late.

Cuellar

Quote from: Cuellar on February 16, 2018, 03:30:29 PM
This sounds great and I intend to buy it. Thanks!

Almost finished this off over the weekend. Completely mad and horrendous. Should have known an anabaptist was behind it - those guys were crazy!

The description of the day-to-day life on the voyage itself sounds harrowing enough, even before it all went really downhill. Enough to drive anyone mad I would have thought.

Ignatius_S

Quote from: Keebleman link=topic=65320.msg3423709#msg3423709quote author=Keebleman link=topic=65320.msg3423709#msg3423709 date=1521129373]
Haven't read this yet but really want to.  Heath was a perverted bastard of Bundy proportions, but unlike Bundy there are - possible - glimpses of someone who truly understood how evil his behaviour was, that it must be stopped and that he must pay for it...

It's a fascinating book, containing a lot of interesting social history - it was one that I was going to recommend but was glad that some beat me to it. O'Connor displays admirable empathy when discussing the murder victims and the effect that their deaths had on the families – and also, Heath's on his own. It's very sensitively written and found it a sobering reflection about how crime is so often written.

O'Connor's book is really well-researched and puts pay to a lot of myths that oft got repeated and challenges the type of narratives usually put forward. Basically, I think you'll find the majority of what you've previously heard/written to be bunk.

However, at the end of the book, I don't think we have satisfactory, concrete answers for why Heath committed the murders. One reason usually given is that he was a sexual sadist, but from what's been presented in the book, I don't find that credible.

I listen to a lot of old-time radio, including three series that dramatised British crime – two of which featured Heath and in fact, one series (The Black Museum, which was presented and narrated by Orson Welles) featured two different retellings (e.g. one included an event when Heath was a teen, the other didn't) but what happened and why were different in each. Two (but not the third) incorporated the idea – which was mooted by a tabloid – that the second murder was an attempt to be able to plead insanity but how this was portrayed was very different. These series, I suspect, reflect how waters were so muddied.

Patrick Hamilton used Heath as source material for his Gorse trilogy and the titular character. In one of the books, it's written that although much was written about Gorse's infamy, only two books about him have some value – but even these are wildly inaccurate in certain claims. Whether he was thinking about what had been written about Heath, I can't say, but it fits that beautifully.

LORD BAD VIBE

I'm glad there are some other fans of Handsome Brute on here.

I find the build up at the hotel prior to Doreen Marshall's murder especially chilling as Keebleman has already described.

As for Heath's motives, I don't suppose we will ever really know for sure. I'm quite surprised he managed to murder anyone at all given the vast quantities of booze he would sling down his throat before the act. I'd have been on the floor.

studpuppet

Quote from: Cuellar on March 19, 2018, 10:22:33 AM
The description of the day-to-day life on the voyage itself sounds harrowing enough, even before it all went really downhill. Enough to drive anyone mad I would have thought.

You've reminded me of 'In The Heart Of The Sea' by Nathaniel Philbrick. They made it into a film that bombed a couple of years ago, but the story is pretty grizzly:

QuoteThe sinking of the whaleship Essex by an enraged spermwhale in the Pacific in November 1820 set in motion one of the most dramatic sea stories of all time: the twenty sailors who survived the wreck took to three small boats (one of which was again attacked by a whale) and only eight of them survived their subsequent 90-day ordeal, after resorting to cannibalising their mates.

Three months after the Essex was broken up, the whaleship Dauphin, cruising off the coast of South America, spotted a small boat in the open ocean. As they pulled alongside they saw piles of bones in the bottom of the boat, at least two skeletons' worth, with two survivors – almost skeletons themselves – sucking the marrow from the bones of their dead ship-mates.

The author uses a hitherto unknown diary of one of the survivors discovered in an attic in Connecticut in spring 1998.

Cuellar

Just the description of the toilet arrangements when the weather turned bad; sailors and soldiers below deck just crapping down into the hold because it would be too dangerous to use the latrines, and then if the pumps were needed in really bad weather

Quotethe urine and faeces that had been deposited below made an unwelcome reappearance. Rather than discharging into the sea [they] simply brought up filth and water from the bilges...and sent it cascading down the gun deck to slosh around sleeping seamen

And the meat that had to be preserved in salt and then boiled in seawater so it ended up so encrusted with salt that it burnt the throat. The fresh water that became so infested with life that the sailors used their teeth to filter out the hundreds of little worms that lived there.

AND THEN to be shipwrecked. Bugger me.

non capisco

I've just started 'Killing For Company' about old laughing boy Dennis Nilsen. Only on the second chapter but I can already tell this a stone cold serial killer classic and for the next week I'll be thoroughly looking forward to my commute when I get to read more about his antics.

Famous Mortimer

Quote from: non capisco on April 06, 2018, 12:14:04 AM
I've just started 'Killing For Company' about old laughing boy Dennis Nilsen. Only on the second chapter but I can already tell this a stone cold serial killer classic and for the next week I'll be thoroughly looking forward to my commute when I get to read more about his antics.
It's a good 'un. As I recall, the book sort of portrays him as being a normal fella outwardly, but my mate's brother (yes, I know) lived on the same street as him, and one day they were stood outside fixing a car when they heard ranting coming from down the street. "Don't worry, that's just Dennis", the brother said, as the renowned serial killer wandered up the street shouting to himself.

ASFTSN

Quote from: Famous Mortimer on April 06, 2018, 02:16:43 PM
It's a good 'un. As I recall, the book sort of portrays him as being a normal fella outwardly, but my mate's brother (yes, I know) lived on the same street as him, and one day they were stood outside fixing a car when they heard ranting coming from down the street. "Don't worry, that's just Dennis", the brother said, as the renowned serial killer wandered up the street shouting to himself.

Melrose Avenue?

Famous Mortimer


ASFTSN

Just asking 'coz my lady grew up on one of the two streets where he did his bad murdahs, can never remember if it was the one where he got caught or not.

non capisco

I did a guilty laugh about his genius plan after the DynoRod guy first discovered his victims' flesh down the drain. Get up in the middle of the night, open up the manhole, scoop out the human flesh and then chuck a load of KFC down there. Brilliant, Dennis.

Famous Mortimer

Quote from: ASFTSN on April 07, 2018, 01:12:24 AM
Just asking 'coz my lady grew up on one of the two streets where he did his bad murdahs, can never remember if it was the one where he got caught or not.
Sorry. I'll ask him next time it pops up. My ex claims to have been in the same club as Peter Sutcliffe one night when he was out on the prowl, but she didn't half talk some shit so I've got to believe that's at least partly a lie.

Pepotamo1985

It's not a 'grizzly' subject in the manner of other books in this thread - although there's a murder in it - but I just finished Man In The Rockefeller Suit and it's a fantastic bit of journalism. Some VWs may be familiar with Clark Rockefeller (or at least, the legend of...) - for those that aren't, 'he' was essentially a conman who came to the US in the 1970s from rural Germany and, over the course of around 30 years, worked his way across the country manipulating and exploiting everyone he came into contact with, employing a variety of increasingly outlandish false identities in the process - each pseudonym pretty much totally bought by anyone and everyone. On top of being an amazing story on its own terms, Mark Seal's detective work is commendable - he evidently undertook a vast amount of footwork to write the book, travelling all over, following every lead, interviewing hundreds of people from every stage of 'Clark's' life.

Ironically, the areas in which his investigative powers seemingly fail him are in explaining Clark's psychology, and indeed how his most significant, enduring cons - perhaps most obviously his wife of 12 years - were pulled off, which are obviously pretty major lacunae, but it's still worth your time.

thraxx

Anne Applebaum is an author that I'm not sure about because I worry she is some kind of right wing agent.  However, she has written loads of excellent books.  'Gulag', is her study of the Russian work camps and it's astonishing both as an accomplishment, but also in terms of how the Soviets (mis)ran, (mal)administrated, and treated the prisoners.  The section on the construction of the White Sea Canal is mind-boggling.  Amazing that the story isn't better known or been made into a film.  Bleak as fuck.

studpuppet

Quote from: thraxx on April 15, 2018, 10:06:11 PM
Anne Applebaum is an author that I'm not sure about because I worry she is some kind of right wing agent.  However, she has written loads of excellent books.  'Gulag', is her study of the Russian work camps and it's astonishing both as an accomplishment, but also in terms of how the Soviets (mis)ran, (mal)administrated, and treated the prisoners.  The section on the construction of the White Sea Canal is mind-boggling.  Amazing that the story isn't better known or been made into a film.  Bleak as fuck.

I wondered if this recent BBC Four doc was based on her book but it doesn't look like it. Obviously covers the same ground though: Gulag

Famous Mortimer

Quote from: studpuppet on April 18, 2018, 12:01:49 AM
I wondered if this recent BBC Four doc was based on her book but it doesn't look like it. Obviously covers the same ground though: Gulag
The first five seconds rang an alarm bell - "we will never know how many people were victims of communism". No-one ever says the Russians killed by the invading White armies after the revolution, or people killed in the Gulf War, are "victims of capitalism", do they? There's not a bit in the Communist Manifesto saying "oh, when we get the chance, we'll kill 20,000,000 of our own people".

Sorry. The documentary may be good, and Stalin was a wrong 'un and no mistake. But it's worrying it started like that.

Quote



If it's grim you want, you can't beat a bit 'o Bundy. I generally don't read these types of books, being a bit squeamish, but I can't help but find old Ted's story intriguing. The interviews are revealing, although Bundy plays the role of a man simply 'hypothesising' what the killer might have done, rather than outright admitting his guilt. Still pretty chilling.

One cold-hearted son of a bitch, but you've got to admit he had a certain charisma. Not that you'd want anyone you cared about within ten miles of him.

Can anyone remeber the name of the Fred & Rose West book that was an extremly grim insight into their world? It got mentioned on CAB several times as the must read for the West Murders.

Quote from: Pinckle Wicker on May 04, 2018, 08:03:00 PM
Can anyone remeber the name of the Fred & Rose West book that was an extremly grim insight into their world? It got mentioned on CAB several times as the must read for the West Murders.

Happy Like Murderers?

It's the only one on them I've read but it's good.

non capisco

Yeah, it'd be 'Happy Like Murderers' by Gordon Burn. Do have nightmares.

Quote from: Nice Relaxing Poo on May 04, 2018, 08:06:10 PM
Happy Like Murderers?

It's the only one on them I've read but it's good.

That's the one, thanks.

Thanks, Non Capisco too.

imitationleather

Quote from: ASFTSN on April 06, 2018, 04:06:17 PM
Melrose Avenue?

I was watching a low-quality true crime documentary (it is my hobby of choice) about someone who murdered a woman he'd met on the internet. The house where he killed her? It was on the very same Melrose Avenue. They completely passed up this opportunity to mention that this was where Dennis Nilsen had lived and done many of his murders. If I was making a low-quality true crime documentary I would have spent at least ten minutes saying that maybe Melrose Avenue is THE MURDER EPICENTRE OF BRITAIN or something. Got a pseudo-scientist on to speculate why this might be, the works.