The Worlds Greatest Unsolved Crimes

by Nigel Blundell, Roger Boar

From theft and fraud to murder, the world's greatest unsolved crimes examines the facts behind the most intriguing crimes of all - those that remain unsolved. Such cases are the stuff of whodunits. But this book is based on real life and not fiction. It reveals the astonishing, known facts about real acts of villainy...and it probes the fascinating, missing facts that confound the law and are kept in a file marked 'Unsolved'.

Genres: Nonfiction, Crime, True Crime, Mystery

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1984

About the author

Nigel Blundell is a journalist who has worked in Australia, the United States and Britain. He spent 25 years in Fleet Street before becoming an author and contributor to national newspapers. He has written more than 40 books, including best-sellers on crime and royalty. He co-wrote the Top Ten exposé Fall of the House of Windsor, which first revealed the so-called ‘Squidgygate’ tape and the infidelity of both Princess Diana and Prince Charles. His other factual subjects have included military history, celebrity scandals, and ghosts and the paranormal.

Reviews

[mwana · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book awakened my inner Sherlock Holmes. It is well researched and the compilations were tastefully chosen. I was particularly enthralled by Who Is R. M. Qualtrough. Read this at your own risk: risk of becoming some amateur sleuth.

[Filipa · Rating 4 out of 5]

O assunto que mais fascina a sociedade. Uma compilação de crimes que não foram resolvidos muito bem conseguida.
As verdadeira histórias dos maiores crimes do século XX e afins.

[Shahrun · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not sure when I did actually read this. It is quite sad reading about all the crimes that have gone undetected. Makes me really wish I had a time machine, so I could find out the answers!

[teddy · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an avid True Crime junkie [and one who specialises in the more obscure, lesser known and dated offences], I assumed that reading The World's Greatest Unsolved Crimes would be somewhat redundant for me. Naively, I believed that I would be well aware of most, if not all, of the crimes within its pages. Shockingly, however, I found many cases I hadn't heard of. Out of the 52 cases this collection covers, my previous knowledge covered just 21. Of course, there are the handful of cases that the majority of people will have at least some basic knowledge on, such as Jack the Ripper, The Black Dahlia, Nazi War Crimes and The Hindenburg Disaster.

Thanks to the array of cases I'd yet to stumble upon, I found myself quite enjoying the book, but that isn't to say it doesn't have its fair share of issues, for example, the somewhat poor editing. If you do decide to pick up a copy of The World's Greatest Unsolved Crimes, be prepared for some outdated information, due to its original publication date of the 1980's. With that being said, I do think that this book would be perfect for anyone hoping to broaden their True Crime knowledge or those who are just dipping their toes in the genre.

[Matilda Persson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Världens största kriminalgåtor är en bra samling av olösta brott. Boken släpptes på 80-talet så en del av informationen är rätt föråldrad och jag vet inte om allt i boken faktiskt stämmer idag. Till exempel blev jag mer intresserad av Kate Bender efter att ha läst kapitlet om henne men när jag grävde lite på internet fick jag inte alls fram samma fakta som stod i boken. Dessutom hade jag gärna sett fler längre avsnitt, vissa fall kände jag till sedan tidigare så därför visste jag att det inte räckte med 2 sidor för att beskriva dem. Men det var en underhållande läsning och där var flera fall som jag aldrig hade hört talas om tidigare och visst är det spännande med olösta brott.

[Ashgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad actually, I found it very interesting, maybe I just didn't like the fact that each story was quite shortened, which I didn't really like, I wish they used fewer detailed stories rather than many quick ones, "like I follow some unsolved mysteries channels on youtube and they tend to offer way more details than that about each case, some of these murders I've read about before so that's how I could tell there was way more to each story than just the murder itself and a suspect"
Overall, I had fun reading it while slowly hating the entire human race more and more by the second

[Tori · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read, even if it feels a little outdated in some ways.

I was expecting to feel annoyed that you never get the satisfying ending, but each tale is like a mini overview and Boar & Blundell cover interesting information for each case.

[Lennart Guldbrandsson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A classic in my family, which I re-read now and it still holds up. Interesting anecdotes told in a easy-to-read way. I'm curious to see a) how many of these are still unsolved or mysteries, and b) how much the book differs from what really happened, if at all.

[Adam Cook · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting! I just wish it had been written with a little more panache.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Classic cases felt should have known more of them that I did

[Charlie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not finished.
Just stopped reading.

[caro esparza · Rating 1 out of 5]

había demasiada prisa por terminar cada caso. no me gustó.

[Luke · Rating 5 out of 5]

From theft and fraud to murder, the world's greatest unsolved crimes examines the facts behind the most intriguing crimes of all - those that remain unsolved. Such cases are the stuff of whodunits. But this book is based on real life and not fiction. It reveals the astonishing, known facts about real acts of villainy...and it probes the fascinating, missing facts that confound the law and are kept in a file marked 'Unsolved'

while reading this book my inner Sherlock Holmes came out but i also tried to channel my inner calumbo trying to already know what happened before i had it all explained to me and then let the case unfold but i already knew what was going on. It didn't work ha ha i tried but some of these cases where just insane at time's i just wished that they were not real and that all these cases where made up but umm sadly this world is not all sun shine and rainbows and these cases actually happend which was quite sad but still interesting to the side of me who is interested in the mind and psychopaths and how they work so on that side i was intrigued but you cant help not feel bad for these poor people.

so overall a really interesting book im still no closer to solves these crimes more smarter and trained professionals have tried and even they haven't figured them out so i got no where close. But that being said i still tried and the cases where written out well every detail so you could break down the case and try to figure it out it was really interesting. So i recommend this for anybody like me who is a huge lover of crime novels/story's true cases or made up ones either way you will enjoy this.

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a well-written compilation of some of the world's most sensational, unsolved crimes; coupled with photos to help the readers imagine the crime scenes as well as the crimes as they unfolded.

The only thing that bothers me, though, is that it doesn't do anything else aside from informing its readers how such crimes were left unsolved over the years. In that case, the book ably served its purpose to familiarize its audience, but nothing else.

Which is frustrating, given that Nigel Blundell is a bloody good writer, and that his style makes his readers clamor for more information...which, unfortunately, is just as far as he could go.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting book, although perhaps a little dated now, as it was written in the early 1980s. It contains case details of lots of unsolved crimes, including infamous crimes such as Jack the Ripper, the Black Dahlia murder, Nazi war crimes, and the Hindenberg disaster. It also contains details of lesser known crimes that I hadn't heard of before.
Also has a few black and white photos scattered throughout the book which were interesting to see.

[Wendy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has a mix of cases I had heard of before and some I hadn't. There was some sloppy editing - November 24, 1971 was not Thanksgiving Day, it was the day before. There's also a photo of Jimmy Hoffa inexplicably captioned "Frank Hoffa". Those are things that could be easily checked, so I wasn't too impressed. Other books have covered the same material and done a better job.

[Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

one of the first books I read and I never tire of reading, although cases of real life, are reported in a manner that increases more intrigue and curiosity of the reader, leaving us thinking about who actually did the crime, the book is very good.

[for-much-deliberation ... · Rating 3 out of 5]

An account of some of the worst unsolved crimes ever to occur in the world

[Rachel 💚 · Rating 4 out of 5]

very interesting read!

[HeraSays · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think I read this when I was about 10 or 11. I remember finding it really fascinating (and this led me to read more of these "The World's Greatest" books.)

[Rebeca Díaz]

This book was in my grandma's house, along with Go ask Alice, some stories were quite interesting, and informative, for example the story of Evita Peron, which I didn't knew til I read this book.

[Prerna]

Got a lot to think about now.

[Caroline · Rating 3 out of 5]

it's okay, an easy read

[Tina · Rating 4 out of 5]

semua kejadiannya terjadi jauh sebelum saya lahir, haha. sangat menarik untuk dibaca dan rasanya jadi kayak seorang detektif yang lagi menganalisa kasus. ya rasanya seperti itu hehe.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

¡Fantástico! Casos extrañísimo, dejan al lector pensando sobre alguna posible explicación...