Murderous Acts

Book excerpt: While the Midwest may be known for salt-of-the-earth folks, it's also home to murder and mayhem. In Murderous Acts: 100 Years of Crime in the Midwest, Keven McQueen explores a century of true crimes committed in 10 Midwestern states, from the 1840s to the 1940s. With a touch of gallows humor, McQueen relies on original research to recount infamous transgressions—including Michigan's Robert Irving Latimer case, the serial murders of Nebraskan Jake Bird, and the bloody deeds of Kansas's Bender family—as well as gruesome tales that are less well known, such as the Wisconsin man with a penchant for swinging an axe at the necks of men he didn't care for, the Hoosier who killed his sweetheart in the midst of a Halloween ball, and the French nobleman who wreaked havoc in a St. Louis hotel. Murderous Acts will intrigue and delight fans of true crime and will send a shiver down the spine of any reader fascinated by the dark history of America's Heartland.