Famous Cold Cases: More Than 50 Major Crimes from Murders and Assassinations, to Kidnappings, Robberies and Fraud

by John D. Wright

This exciting true-crime compendium explores more than 50 challenging criminal cases that were only recently solved . . . or remain unsolved.
 
Jack the Ripper and the Zodiac Killer. The kidnapping of little Madeleine McCann. The £22 million robbery of the British Bank in Beirut. What all these have in common is they’re cold investigators have closed the file because they’re out of leads. Famous Cold Cases presents more than 50 of these unsolved or recently solved crimes in a dossier format, with examples arranged chronologically and with featured boxes. Each chapter focuses on a specific criminal activity, from murder and political assassinations to kidnapping, robbery, and fraud. Notorious cases include the murder of JonBenét Ramsey, the search for Teamster boss Jimmy Hoffa, the spectacular escape of hijacker D. B. Cooper, the assassination of Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto, and the poisoning of communist defector Alexander Litvinenko in London. This engrossing book invites you to review each case, analyze the evidence, and try to figure out the most likely culprit.

Genres: True Crime, Nonfiction

256 pages, Paperback

Published August 6, 2019

About the author

John D. Wright is an American author and editor living in England. He has been a reporter in London for Time and People magazines, covering such subjects as politics and crime. He is the author of several history books, including The Oxford Dictionary of Civil War Quotations and The Routledge Encyclopedia of Civil War Era Biographies. Among his other books are Crime Investigation and Unsolved Crimes. He holds the Ph.D. degree in Communications from the University of Texas and has taught writing at three universities.

Reviews

[Quenya · Rating 3 out of 5]

So the big plus for me in this book was how it was organized. I could read it in any order and jump to the crime that most interested me. It was very well laid out for easy reading. The stories gave you just enough information to get familiar with and to also pique your interest in some. There were several crimes (especially ones outside of the U.S.) that I hadn’t heard so it was a nice break from the regular headline making crimes. I actually read the book in reverse order and saved the murders and assassinations for last. I had forgot a book to read in a hotel room and this fit the bill.

[Rachel Harrison · Rating 2 out of 5]

Easy book to read. Didn’t really enjoy the ‘Lingering Doubts’ after each case. Kind of a bit of waste of space if I’m honest. The writing had quite a few mistakes in it, and I don’t think they delved deep enough into each case for it to be a good read.
Always love reading these kinds of books though, as a lot of cases are unknown.

Not really keen on unsolved fraud and robberies but they were kind of interesting I guess.

[MReads · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book reviewing cold cases, with detail on the crimes, suspects, and where they stand now, plus some discussion points. I'd have preferred fewer, more in depth studies, but that's a wholly personal thing. If you like true crime and would like a book to dip in and out of, then this might be right up your alley.

This review is of a NetGalley edition provided in return for an honest review.

[S · Rating 4 out of 5]

The gives an interesting but brife look at fifty cold cases from different parts of the world and includes a look at the investigation into the cases. I would recommend this to people who have never heard of these crimes it is a great book for dipping in and out of.

[Sophia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very intriguing book, but I noticed a lot of spelling and grammatical errors

[Nicole · Rating 2 out of 5]

Boring. Too many cases, not in depth enough enough on the interesting ones. It just didn't interest me much past the first section (murder).

[Pascale Dupont-Mathieu · Rating 5 out of 5]

If u like this kind of stuff then this book is perfect.
I've enjoyed reading this book

[Carlye Krul · Rating 3 out of 5]

We're going to pretend there wasn't any grammatical errors and give it three stars.

[Emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of these cold cases I have heard over and over but there were some that were new to me.

[Paola (ElvenBookworm) · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall a really entertaining read, but the writing seemed horribly amateur. The spelling and grammar errors were ghastly. Also I hope I never see another run-on sentence in my life.