Bestselling true-crime master Harold Schechter explores the real-life headline-making psychos, serial murderers, thrill-hungry couples, and lady-killers who inspired a century of classic films. The necktie murders in Alfred Hitchcock's Frenzy; Chicago's Jazz Age crime of passion; the fatal hookup in Looking for Mr. Goodbar; the high school horrors committed by the costumed slasher in Scream. These and other cinematic crimes have become part of pop-culture history. And each found inspiration in true events that provided the raw material for our greatest blockbusters, indie art films, black comedies, Hollywood classics, and grindhouse horrors. So what's the reality behind Psycho, Badlands, The Hills Have Eyes, A Place in the Sun, Arsenic and Old Lace, and Dirty Harry? How did such tabloid-ready killers as Bonnie and Clyde, body snatchers Burke and Hare, Texas sniper Charles Whitman Jr., nurse-slayer Richard Speck, and Leopold and Loeb exert their power on the public imagination and become the stuff of movie lore? In this collection of revelatory essays, true-crime historian Harold Schechter takes a fascinating trip down the crossroads of fact and fiction to reveal the sensational real-life stories that are more shocking, taboo, and fantastic than even the most imaginative screenwriter can dream up.

A collection of fun and surprising facts about our world.

Read hundreds of weird but true stories.

Presents facts, brief stories, and photos on topics including extreme body art, incredible inventions, and strange travel destinations.

Discover the shocking #1 New York Times bestseller: the true story of a young NFL player's first-degree murder conviction and untimely death -- and his journey from the Patriots to prison. Aaron Hernandez was a college All-American who became the youngest player in the NFL and later reached the Super Bowl. His every move as a tight end with the New England Patriots played out the headlines, yet he led a secret life -- one that ended in a maximum-security prison. What drove him to go so wrong, so fast? Between the summers of 2012 and 2013, not long after Hernandez made his first Pro Bowl, he was linked to a series of violent incidents culminating in the death of Odin Lloyd, a semi-pro football player who dated the sister of Hernandez's fiancée, Shayanna Jenkins. All-American Murder is the first book to investigate Aaron Hernandez's first-degree murder conviction and the mystery of his own shocking and untimely death.

A hacker thriller, ripped from the headlines of today's newspapers, envisioning a chilling future where citizen hackers are pitted against unaccountable global actors.

New York Post absurd? Or Onion-like fiction? You decide! British woman weds dolphin! Two minor girls married off to frogs! Tennessee man marries goat! Here's the story: two of these headlines are true - and one's true bologna. Which are straight off the presses? And which one is straight out of the author's mind? It's up to you to decide! The headlines in this book are all so outlandish that it's hard to believe any one of them is true. From stories like "Teen steals bus, picks up passengers" to "World's priciest pigeon goes for $328,000," you'll need to have quite the discerning eye to recognize which are ripped from real newspapers. Filled with hundreds of outrageously authentic headlines, this book leaves you wondering, "Did they really print that?"

Read hundreds of weird but true stories.