The high times, the rubouts, the payoffs -- they're all here in Wayne Klatt's account of the Windy City's wildest years. The entire country -- the world -- was shocked and entertained by what went on in Chicago during Prohibition. Learn how it all happened, from a step-by-step speakeasy set-up to the White Sox scandal to the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Pull back the gauzy curtains of the gaudy era when Al Capone contributed to Mayor William Thompson's campaign and Governor Len Small used...

Chicago's breathtaking Lake Shore Drive, with its beaches and luxury homes, has its origin in a neglected marsh and a clandestine land development. Meet the uncrowned king of the disputed shore, George Wellington Streeter, the outlandish swindler, unlikely hero and self-proclaimed founder of the Gold Coast who tried to secede from the state of Illinois. Opposing him was the quiet vision of Potter Palmer and the full weight of his investment syndicate. With this keen piece of investigative ...

In 1980, Terrence Hake was a young assistant prosecutor in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office in Chicago, Illinois. In April of that year, he agreed to assist the FBI and the United States Attorney’s Office in an investigation of the county court system, known nationwide to be a hotbed of bribery, corruption, and mob ties.For three and a half years, untrained and with ever-diminishing naiveté, Hake worked undercover posing as a corrupt prosecutor by accepting bribes from att...

On the night of April 7, 1990, newlyweds Nancy and Richard Langert were brutally shot in the basement of their suburban Chicago home. There were no leads. Nothing was stolen. The only clue was an illegible message Nancy left behind, written in her own blood. It was a crime that shocked the community and baffled the FBI and seven local police departments. They explored every prospect -- from IRA assassinations to Mafia hit. But it was a tough Illinois policewoman who would track down the ki...

Larry W. Eyler was caught in 1983, accused of being the "homosexual highway killer," responsible for 22 murders in three states. Unbelievably, he was indicted for just one killing and spent three months in jail before an Illinois judge determined that the overwhelming evidence against him was tainted. He was released. Six months later Eyler was caught again. This time he was accused of a brutal, unimaginable murder of a 15-year-old street hustler. Crime journalist Gera-Lind Kolarik was the...

Operation Greylord was the longest and most successful undercover investigation in FBI history, and the largest corruption bust ever in the U.S. It resulted in bribery and tax charges against 103 judges, lawyers, and other court personnel, and, eventually, more than seventy indictments.And it was led by Terrence Hake, a young assistant prosecutor in the Cook County State's Attorney's Office in Chicago, who worked undercover for nearly four years, accepting bribes, making payoffs, w...

From the world's #1 bestselling author comes the story of the criminal lawyer who represented everybody from Manuel Noriega to John Gotti to Bernie Goetz—and won every single case.Known for his sharp mind, sharp suits, and bold courtroom strategies, Bronx-native Barry Slotnick is known as the best criminal lawyer in the US. He calls himself “Liberty’s Last Champion.”Slotnick mediates Bette Midler’s bathhouse contract and re...

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Good War: A masterpiece of modern journalism and "a huge anthem in praise of the American spirit" ( Saturday Review).In this "invaluable record" of one of the most dramatic periods in modern American history, Studs Terkel recaptures the Great Depression of the 1930s in all its complexity. Featuring a mosaic of memories from politicians, businessmen, artists, striking...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER: This classic true crime account about the mafia hitman who claims he killed Jimmy Hoffa inspired Scorsese’s epic gangster movie, The Irishman.Now updated with substantial post-publication corroboration of Sheeran’s confessions to the killings of Jimmy Hoffa and Joey Gallo.“I heard you paint houses” are the first words Jimmy Hoffa ever spoke to Frank “the Irishman” Sheeran. To paint a house is to ...

The masterfully told story of twelve volatile days in the life of Chicago, when an aviation disaster, a race riot, a crippling transit strike, and a sensational child murder transfixed and roiled a city already on the brink of collapse.When 1919 began, the city of Chicago seemed on the verge of transformation. Modernizers had an audacious, expensive plan to turn the city from a brawling, unglamorous place into "the Metropolis of the World." But just as the dream se...

"Sam, could you do me a favor?" Thus begins a story that has now become part of America’s true crime hall of fame. It is a gory, grotesque tale befitting a Stephen King novel. It is also a David and Goliath saga-the story of a young lawyer fresh from the Public Defender’s Office whose first client in private practice turns out to be the worst serial killer in our nation’s history.Sam Amirante had just opened his first law practice when he got a phone call from his friend J...

With a new preface, a "profound, chilling, and heartbreaking, contribution to American history" that investigates the causes of the twentieth century's deadliest race riot and how its legacy has scarred and shaped a community ( Boston Globe).On May 30, 1921, a misunderstanding between a white elevator operator and a Black delivery boy escalated into the worse race riot in U.S. history. In this compelling and deeply human account, James Hirsch investigates h...