Customer Reviews
Four shotgun blasts that changed a town forever! - By: Michael Murphy, 05 Oct 2008 
Recently re-read this disturbing factional story of unspeakable horror after some thirty odd years, re-visiting the pain of Holcomb, the scene of the tragic, senseless snuffing out of the Clutters. Contoversial on its publication due to its blending of fact & fiction, a hybrid composite that had not been done before, Capote's "In Cold Blood" reconstucts,in all their brutal detail, the 1959 grisly, cold-blooded murder of the Clutter family on their farmin the plains of western
Kansas when four shotgun blasts changed the town of Holcomb forever.
Capote's meticulous reconstruction covers the lead-up to the gruesome murders & the aftermath. In the lead-up, Capote builds suspense & tension by cross-cutting lntermittently between descriptions of the routine domestic life of the Cluttersin their small farming community near Holcomb & the unstable lives of drifters Smith & Hickock what's chilling is their humanessin the picture Capote draws - as they drift cross-country to Holcomb. The aftermath comprehensively covers the search for & apprehension of the killers & their subsequent trial & incarceration on death row. WARNING - the amoral Perry Smith may make your blood run cold!
Capote's case-study is concerned not just with the who of the crime but the why, probing into every facet of the lives of the killers, the background influences that shaped them, taking us into their minds to give us the opportunity to get to know them, exploring the psyche of the criminal mind, to discover the psychological motivation that can turn men into monsters. Aforerunner of classic true-crime titles sush as "Fatal Vision" by Joe McGinnis & "Daddy's Girl" by Clifford Irvine, "In Cold Blood" is itself, an American classic.
Masterpiece of crime writing - By: Sally Wilton, 25 Aug 2008 I read this book over several weeks yet every time I picked it up I was able to get straight back into the story. I think this is slightly due to the style of writing giving out accurate informationin a chronological order similar to a long running news story.
Capote's writing is always brilliant whatever he writes about. There is no word wasted here, no over the top descriptions just a very gripping true story told from every angle. He doesnt judge anyone involved but gives enough detail to make you sympathise 'almost' with the killers.
Before reading this book the only story I knew of Kansas was the Wizard of OZ which also evokes the huge plains where farming is the main source of income, windy & lonesome with god fearing, hard working farming folk making a living. Then one night this terrible crime takes place. Capote relives each & every minute of the crime, the getaway, eventual capture & the court hearing & outcome. A great bookin every way.
Crime, punishment, and more - By: Philip Spires, 15 Jul 2008 In Cold Blood by Truman Capote was publishedin 1966, & is based on events that happened almost fifty years ago. The events were real. This is not a work of fiction. The Clutters, an appropriately surnamed Kansas family, have their own complications within their rambling homestead. What family doesn't? Clutter the father is a farmer. Who isn'tin these parts? Life is not so productive of late. Whose is? The two younger children, a daughter & a son, still live in. The others have left, happily.
And then,in November 1959, the four Clutters are found gagged, apart from the mother, all with their throats cut & their brains blown out by shotgun fire. The community isin turmoil. No-one can explain why anyone might have wanted to kill a whole familyin Holcomb, a small, poor, rural communityin the mid-West Bible belt.
Hickock (Hicock) & Smith are two lads on the move. Their families might be dysfunctional. On the other hand they might not. Their socialisation might have been lacking. On the other hand it might not. For whatever reason, individually & collectively they prey on others, preyin a way that renders them culpable, detectable & ultimately punishable. They know thieving is wrong. So, one of them says, we've stolen lives, so it must be serious. It was the two of them that pulled the trigger, that blew brains out, that slit throats, that did not quite commit rape. There are limits. And all for forty dollars & a transistor radio.
I give nothing of this book away when I reveal that the two lads did commit the murders - exactly how no-one ever admitted - & that, after years of litigious wrangling, both were hanged. The strength of In Cold Blood is not what happens, but how it happens.
Truman Capote offers us a vast bookin just four sustained chapters, each of which is sub-divided as the narrative shifts between aspects of the different protagonists' lives. Throughout, the style is much more complex than mere journalism, but the clarity with which it communicates is at times breathtaking. We hear from those directly involved, both victims & perpetrators, their families, the police, the judiciary, the neighbours, the lawyers, the passers-by, the acquaintances, the cellmates. The detail is forensic.
It is essential that the reader is constantly reminded that this is not fiction. Truman Capote offers dialogue where a journalist would report, offers interpretation where an historian would defer, offer opinion where an observer might decline. And so In Cold Blood becomes & absorbing, multi-faceted, mid-twentieth century reworking of Crime And Punishment. The crucial difference that the intervening years have generated is that where the latter concentrated on the individual circumstances & motives of the perpetrator, In Cold Blood explores the social & the contextual alongside the psychological.
And this is where the book becomes deeply disturbing, because it seems to suggest that the individuality that contemporary society seems to demand of us might itself promote a degree of self-centredness, of selfishness, perhaps, that might give rise to nothing less than contempt for others. In the forty years since the publication of In Cold Blood, it could be argued that such pressures might have increased. Frightening, indeed.
A Truly Great Book - By: M. Rowe, 07 Jan 2008 This is one of the finest books I have ever read. It is gripping & vivid from start to finish & evokes fascination & emotion. It is also cleverly workedin the structural sensein that a picture of the killers, the murdered family, the police & the community is painted through quotations from actual people who were there at the time.
Capote is also a very gifted writer & his penmanship adds great poignancy & heart to the gruesome story.
Terrifyingly Magnificent. - By: maya j, 08 Sep 2007 'In Cold Blood' is one of the best books of all time. It should be required readingin all beginning college lit courses, if notin high school. I first read 'In Cold Blood'in high school (in the 80s), & I read itin one sitting- straight through the night- just because I couldn't put it down. I have recently purchased this newer edition, because this book is worth reading again.
To begin with, Truman Capote, for all his notoriety, was an incredible writer, & this book is one of his finest. The gritty & depressing existence of Dick & Perry that leads up to one terrifying nightin Kansas is so vividly represented, you feel all the more frightened as you are reading it, because it seems you have become witness to the absolute terror & brutality perpetrated on an innocent family by these two men. Truman Capote not only presentsin graphic detail the terror of this night, but he also reveals the personalities of Dick & Perryin such a way that, even though they are despicable human beings, you may feel a twinge of sorrow for them. The birth of each man's anger, & the inability of either one of them to integrate into society, was formedin childhoods of abuse. It truly is amazing how Capote got inside the heads of these pathetic men, capturing the pervasive sadness & despair, bizarrely coupled with hope for a "normal" future. The relationship of Dick & Perry is almost a symbiotic one. Separately, they may not have done what they did, but together, they are lethal. The gullibility of a person, who never felt like he belonged, combined with another person who thinks he needs to exact revenge on society- it's a sick combination of pack mentality & ignorance. Eventually, all of this culminates into a night of terrorin Kansas wrought by these two men. The portrayal is so graphicin nature; no one could read it without being rendered silently stunned by the terror of it all. The sadness felt for this totally unsuspecting & wholly innocent family is overwhelming. Certainly there have been similar crimes, but the representation of it by Capote, & the intrinsic knowledge of these two men, makes you feel you had a front row view of the whole thing.
`In Cold Blood' is less about the particulars of that awful crime one terrifying nightin Kansas; it is more about the insidiousness of what childhood abuse & feeling disenfranchised can do to a person. It would be easy to focus on the terror & sadness of this massacre, but the brilliance of Capote is that the focus is placed on the murderers & trying to engender compassion from the reader for them. With Capote's visionin writing, he almost gets us there. After the capture & imprisonment of these two men, you can physically feel the fearin their hearts for their own condemnation. Perry's fear of execution is especially haunting. This book is a must read for anyone who likes to read & makes no difference that it was written 40 years ago. It transcends all genres, because even though the story is terrifying, the writing is phenomenal, & you will NEVER forget it.
