18 books like Gang of One

What to read after Gang of One — books similar to it, matched on shared themes.

Mother Night Kurt Vonnegut · 1961 · ★ 4.2 · 206p · ≈ 6h · Moderate Mother Night is a daring challenge to our moral sense. American Howard W. Campbell, Jr., a spy during World War II, is now on trial in Israel as a Nazi war criminal. But is he really guilty? In this brilliant book rife with true gallows humor, Vonnegut turns black and white into a chilling shade of gray with a verdict that will haunt us all. Shares: Prisoners

The Ballad of Reading Gaol Oscar Wilde · 1896 · ★ 4.3 · 49p · ≈ 1h · Challenging The Ballad of Reading Gaol is a poem by Oscar Wilde, written in exile in Berneval-le-Grand and Naples, after his release from HM Prison Reading on 19 May 1897. Wilde had been incarcerated in Reading after being convicted of gross indecency with other men in 1895 and sentenced to two years' hard labour in prison. Shares: Imprisonment, Prisons, Prisoners

Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption Stephen King · 1982 · ★ 4.5 · 128p · ≈ 4h · Moderate Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption is a novella by Stephen King from his 1982 collection Different Seasons, subtitled Hope Springs Eternal. The novella has also been published as a standalone book. The story is entirely told by the character Red, in a narrative he claims to have been writing from September 1975 to January 1976, with an additional chapter added in spring… Shares: Prisons, Prisoners

De profundis Oscar Wilde · 1905 · ★ 4.2 · 151p · ≈ 5h · Challenging Obra de expiación del escritor irlandés Oscar Wilde (1854-1900). Acusado de pederastia, homosexualidad y al borde del suicidio al ser condenado a dos años de prisión, Wilde encuentra consuelo en la meditación del dolor y del sufrimiento a través de la vida, pasión y muerte de un Jesús humanizado. Arrepentido de su oprobiosa culpa, desea rehacer su vida y encontrar una nueva felicidad. Shares: Imprisonment, Prisons, Prisoners

The Racketeer John Grisham · 2012 · ★ 3.9 · 381p · ≈ 12h · Moderate When a federal judge and his secretary fail to appear for a scheduled trial and panicked clerks call for an FBI investigation, a harrowing murder case ensues and culminates in the imprisonment of a lawyer who imparts the story of who killed the judge and why. "... El cadáver del juez fue hallado en su cabaña a la orilla de un lago. La entrada no había sido forzada. Lo único que encontraron… Shares: Imprisonment, Prisoners

Invisible Darkness Stephen Williams · 1996 · ★ 4.0 · 553p · ≈ 18h · Moderate Invisible Darkness is the story of one of the more bizarre cases in recent memory--killings so sensational that they prompted the Canadian government, in the interests of justice, to silence its national press and to lock foreign journalists out of the courts.To all appearances, Paul and Karla Bernardo had a fairytale marriage--beautiful working-class girl weds bright upper-middle-class guy and… Shares: True Crime

Nice Girl Rachael Jane Chin · 2011 Nice Girl? is a 1941 American musical comedy film directed by William A. Seiter and starring Deanna Durbin, Franchot Tone, Walter Brennan, Robert Stack, and Robert Benchley. Based on the play Nice Girl? by Phyllis Duganne, the film is about a young girl who finds herself attracted to one of her fathers business partners who comes to town to give her father a scholarship for his dietary studies. Shares: True Crime

Outlaws Adam Shand · 2011 What's it like to be an outlaw biker? 'We're dd magnets,' one of them tells Adam Shand. 'Drunks in bars like to test themselves against a so-called outlaw.' Once seen as a free-wheeling, brawling, pleasure-seeking bunch of misfits rolling down the highways, bikers are now cast as social bogeymen. If you believe the dire warnings of the media and politicians, they are an organised crime threat on… Shares: True Crime

The Authentic Life of Billy, The Kid Pat Garrett · 2008 · 128p · ≈ 4h · Moderate Hankering for a mostly true tale about the hard-living desperadoes who inhabited America's desert Southwest in the mid-1800s? This biography of the ill-fated gunslinger Billy, the Kid was written by Pat Garrett, the sheriff who shot Billy down. Although some historians now question the veracity of some of the self-aggrandizing bluster Garrett and his ghostwriter included in the book, The… Shares: True Crime

Last Yakuza Jake Adelstein · 2017 · ★ 4.4 · 408p · ≈ 13h · Moderate The Last Yakuza tells the history of the yakuza like it’s never been told before.Makoto Saigo is half-American and half-Japanese in small-town Japan with a set of talents limited to playing guitar and picking fights. With rock stardom off the table, he turns toward the only place where you can start from the bottom and move up through sheer merit, loyalty, and brute force — the yakuza.Saigo,… Shares: True Crime

Dead Run Joe Jackson · 1999 · ★ 4.0 · 310p · ≈ 10h · Moderate "Summers are always stifling in southern Virginia, and they're even hotter on the Mecklenburg Correctional Center's Death Row when Dennis Stockton arrives there in July 1983. Charged with murder for hire, Stockton insisted he was innocent, but his jury sentenced him to die. In prison, he begins keeping a diary and it soon becomes his lifeline, nurturing dreams of freedom and publication as an… Shares: Prisoners, True Crime

Seven Bones Peter Seymour · 2011 · 284p · ≈ 9h · Moderate Seven Bones is the story of one of the more bizarre murder investigations in Australia’s criminal history. Two wives die in suspicious circumstances: co-incidence or, as husband Thomas Keir describes it, ‘bad luck’?Arriving on the scene, Detective Peter Seymour realised he was dealing with the world’s unluckiest husband or a serial wife killer. Keir’s ‘grieving husband’ act was suddenly in… Shares: True Crime

A Talent to Deceive William Norris · 2006 · 327p · ≈ 10h · Moderate The kidnapping and murder of Charles Lindbergh's infant son, and the subsequent trial and execution of Bruno Richard Hauptmann, have been a source of fascination for more than 70 years. Now, for the first time, William Norris delves into sources of information ignored by previous investigators and comes up with the identity of the true culprit. Lindbergh is exposed as having obstructed the… Shares: True Crime

The trial of Dr. Adams Sybille Bedford · 1958 · 245p · ≈ 8h · Moderate Taken from a review: Here is the accused, Dr. John Adams, being tried for the murder of Mrs. Morell (after rumors connected with other ""mysterious"" deaths) six years previously (there were 16 other, earlier charges). Then come the nurses in attendance on Mrs. Morell, next the doctors in the hands of the prosecution. The defense takes over the cross-examination and, after the closing speeches,… Shares: True Crime

Born Killers Christopher Berry-Dee · 2006 · 270p · ≈ 9h · Moderate But no matter how many people they have killed, no matter how many lives they have ruined and whatever the nature of their sickening crimes, serial killers are still human. Analysing the early years of the lives of men like Jeffrey Dahmer, who abused and killed 17 young men, offers a fascinating insight into the effects of a dysfunctional or abusive childhood. Criminologists Christopher… Shares: True Crime

Blind Faith Joe McGinniss · 1981 · ★ 3.7 · 448p · ≈ 14h · Moderate The Marshalls were the model family of Tom’s River, New Jersey, living the American dream of all that money could buy. Rob Marshall was the big breadwinner, king of the country club set. Maria Marshall was his stunningly beautiful wife and the perfect mom to their three great kids. Then one night Rob, his head bloodied, reported Maria had been brutally slain. Sympathy poured in—until… Shares: True Crime

Abgeschnitten Sebastian Fitzek · 2013 · 358p · ≈ 11h · Moderate Als een forensisch patholoog in het hoofd van een gruwelijk verminkt lichaam een capsule vindt met daarin het telefoonnummer van zijn dochter die ontvoerd blijkt te zijn, begint daarmee een koortsachtige speurtocht naar haar. Shares: True Crime

Big Shots Adam Shand · 2007 · ★ 3.5 · 423p · ≈ 14h · Moderate Vast shoplifting ring operating in Britain'A highly organised gang of Australian shoplifters is at work in Britain stealing goods worth hundreds of thousands of pounds a year. New members of the gang are flown from Australia whenever the organisers want replacements.'The Guardian, 15 August 1968From the mid 1960s, a brazen band of Australian thieves ran riot in London for more than a decade,… Shares: True Crime

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