Bonnie and Clyde: The Lives Behind the Legend
(Libby/OverDrive eAudiobook)

Almost 75 years ago, the four-year murder and robbery spree of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow ended in a hail of bullets on a desolate Louisiana road. During those four years, the Barrow Gang held up a few banks, knocked over numerous grocery stores, killed several police officers, and successfully cast themselves as latter-day Robin Hoods struggling against an unjust social order. This work strives, successfully for the most part, to strip away the sensationalism and view the couple and their exploits accurately. More lyrical than Jeff Guinn in Go Down Together: The True, Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde (2009), Schneider uses the words and even thoughts of key players to tell their story. He eloquently describes the bleak, Depression-era environment that helped spawn Bonnie and Clyde and made the public willing to accept a pair of damaged souls as romantic figures. For both crime aficionados and general readers with an interest in the era, this book is of great value.--Freeman, Jay Copyright 2009 Booklist

The lives and the legends of doomed outlaw lovers Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker unfortunately take a back seat to Schneider's narrative style in this heavily researched but poorly executed account. Despite his claim that no dialogue has been invented, Schneider's approach-addressing Clyde as "you" ("Feels like you and Bonnie are hot as hell everywhere")-is jarring and irritating. Opening in 1934 when Bonnie and Clyde helped several prisoners break out from Eastham Prison Farm in Texas, , Schneider (Brutal Journey) then rewinds to Clyde's hardscrabble youth in the slums outside Dallas, where he met Bonnie in 1930. The increasingly violent exploits of the Barrow Gang are evocative, especially Clyde's first-and arguably only-premeditated murder in 1931. Yet true to his style, even in their final moments in the ambushed, bullet-ridden car, Schneider forces on readers his own version of Clyde's last thoughts-"you remember Bonnie drinking hot chocolate"-and ruins what should have been a moment of literal and literary silence. B&w photos. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Who hasn't heard of Bonnie and Clyde Barrow? The story of their murderous crime spree during the Great Depression has been told numerous times in both print and film. These new books provide lengthy, detailed descriptions of their many crimes, as well as comprehensive reviews of their backgrounds. Schneider (Brutal Journey), in particular, emphasizes the social climate of the era, as encountered especially by Clyde-oddly, the book is composed in the second person, as addressed empathetically to Clyde himself, leading the author into language that is impressionistic and somewhat disconcerting to encounter in sourced nonfiction. Although Schneider does not justify the criminal lives of the Barrows, his aim may be to show that their story is relevant today, when members of modern street gangs sometimes view a life of crime as their best way out of poverty. Relying on unpublished manuscripts and testimonies and written sources that he deems reliable, Guinn (former book editor, Fort Worth Star-Telegram; The Christmas Chronicles) reminds us that many stories of Bonnie and Clyde were exaggerated in the news, resulting in myths he challenges here. For example, they were very inept crooks. Although he does not provide as comprehensive a review of the era's social climate as Schneider, Guinn explains how celebrities reflect the needs of their particular time. In addition, his coverage of the law enforcement effort to bring down Bonnie and Clyde is more detailed than Schneider's. He accurately points out that the general public idolized Bonnie and Clyde because of their rebel image of sticking it to bankers and the law during a period of economic and social struggles. Ultimately, the public adoration changed when Bonnie and Clyde killed two motorcycle cops. Many readers may feel that they've already had enough of these two, but both books are fine additions to the literature, although Schneider's approach takes some getting used to. Guinn's is more strongly recommended if one must choose.-Tim Delaney, SUNY at Oswego (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Fast-paced account of the fast-lived lives of Mr. Barrow and Ms. Parker. In Arthur Penn's 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde, Faye Dunaway was a fine fit for Bonnie, who, said one eyewitness, "could turn heads." Schneider (Brutal Journey: The Epic Story of the First Crossing of North America, 2006, etc.) is inclined to a touch more noirish poetry, describing the young Dallas waitress as looking "like a piece of candydressed in a funny uniform with enormous lapels, like some cross between a French maid and Raggedy Anne, and she's barely taller than the big brass cash register on the counter." But Warren Beatty? Well, Clyde Barrow wasn't the king stud of the Texas bad guysthat honor went to a contemporary aptly named "Dapper Dan"but rather a thin drink of water, albeit with a very bad attitude and a solid record of standing tall before judges. Schneider takes some risk in attempting to put himself into the heads of Bonnie, Clyde and assorted criminals and lawmen. But, as he points out in a note on sources, the story has been well covered before by numerous contemporaries of the Depression-era dastardly duo, so that there are plenty of primary sources to back up his claims. Schneider does a righteous job of understanding Bonnie and Clyde, and if they're not wholly sympatheticthey did kill folks, after allthey're not wholly monstrous either. Thanks to Penn's film, there are plenty of people who have some sense of how they lived and diedspectacularly, and without much regard for the messes they left behind. Schneider shows how oddly accurate the film got at least those final moments, all rat-a-tat machine guns and chirping cicadas. A pleasure for true-crime buffs and a better read than Jeff Guinn's Go Down Together (2009)though Guinn breaks more news. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.