The riveting story of how the murder of femme fatale Vivian Gordon in 1931 brought about the downfall of the mayor of New York City and led to the end of Tammany Hall's dominance. Vivian Gordon went out before midnight in a velvet dress and mink coat. Her body turned up the next morning in a desolate Bronx park, a dirty clothesline wrapped around her neck. At her stylish Manhattan apartment, detectives discovered notebooks full of names-businessmen,...

They have names like Barmy Bernie, Daft Donald, and Steamin' Sammy. They like lager (in huge quantities), the Queen, football clubs (especially Manchester United), and themselves. Their dislike encompasses the rest of the known universe, and England's soccer thugs express it in ways that range from mere vandalism to riots that terrorize entire cities. Now Bill Buford, editor of the prestigious journal Granta, enters this alternate society and records...

"Here's the complete Mona Lisa story which includes that of the world's most famous art theft for which Pablo Picasso was arrested as a suspect"--

On November 24, 1971, an unidentified man hijacked an airplane that was flying from Portland, Oregon, to Seattle, Washington. He demanded $200,000 and told a flight attendant that he had weapons. After stopping in Seattle, the hijacker was given the money and he released the attendants. But he demanded that the pilots stay on-board, refuel, and fly him to Mexico City. Just thirty minutes after the plane took off, the man jumped out of the aircraft...

"In September 2011, Erik Weissman and two friends were murdered in a brutal triple homicide in Waltham, Massachusetts. The case went unsolved for months and then years, with no discernible leads. Erik’s friend Susan Zalkind, an investigative journalist, needed closure and knew that finding it would be up to her. As Susan began digging, and as the Boston Marathon bombing exposed startling new leads, the case led her down a tangled and sometimes dangerous...

"All the admirals in the US Navy knew Leonard Glenn Francis--either personally or by his legendary reputation. He was the larger-than-life defense contractor who greeted them on the pier whenever they visited ports in Asia, ready to show them a good time after weeks at sea while his company resupplied their ships and submarines. He was famed throughout the fleet for the gluttonous parties he hosted for officers: $1,000-per-person dinners at Asia's...

Part true crime, part courtroom drama, this moving story of an unexpected friendship between two very different men recounts the case of Alvin Ridley, an autistic TV repair man accused of murdering his wife, and the lawyer who believe in--and proved--his innocence. In October 1997, the town of Ringgold in northwest Georgia was shaken by reports of a murder in its midst. A dead woman was found in Alvin Ridley's house--and even more shockingly, she...

"Peabody and Emmy Award-winning journalist Jane Marie expands on her popular podcast The Dream to expose the scourge of multilevel marketing schemes and how they have profited off the evisceration of the American working class. We've all heard of Amway, Mary Kay, Tupperware, and LuLaRoe, but few know the nefarious way they and countless other multilevel marketing (MLM) companies prey on desperate Americans struggling to make ends meet. When factories...

"Before the sensational cases of Amanda Knox and Casey Anthony--before even Lizzie Borden--there was Polly Bodine, the first American woman put on trial for capital murder in our nation's debut media circus. On Christmas night, December 25, 1843, in a serene village on Staten Island, shocked neighbors discovered the burnt remains of twenty-four-year-old mother Emeline Houseman and her infant daughter, Ann Eliza. In a perverse nativity, someone bludgeoned...

"Hollywood starlet Lana Turner was one Tinseltown's most recognizable faces in the 1940s and 50s. But, when the Academy Award-winning actress began dating mobster Johnny Stompanato-a thug for west coast mob boss Mickey Cohen-all the lights and glamor of Hollywood did not brighten the darkness of her personal life. Johnny's intense jealousy over Lana ruled their relationship from the get-go and Lana's daughter, Cheryl, witnessed her mother's bruises...