To call Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood a masterpiece would not be an understatement, but merely a matter of fact. It is the story of the murder of a well to do family from a small Kansas town by two villains-villains we are made to know and understand and have certain feelings of sympathy for. In Cold Blood might be called the first Non-fiction Novel, as it is told in the manner of a story with characters and there seems to be a plot rolling through the events that make them inevitable.
Even now, fifty years later, after the advent of drive-by shootings, school shootings, mass suicides, and the common place facts of murder we see on a daily basis-this story still has the power to effect the reader. It is because of the novel-like feel of the work. We come to know the Clutters, who are murdered for no reason whatsoever, and Dick and Perry, the murders who have no conscious. The fact that they are real people and not make believe only makes the story all the more horrible.
There is a tremendous amount of suspense built up over the course of the book. Even after we know that the Clutters are murdered, it still comes as a shock when, much later, the exact nature of the crime is explained in vivid detail. The normal shock that these were more or less normal men who did this, that stone cold killers are often more or less normal people.
The audio book has the perfect narrator in Scott Brick, as he has just the right drawl for the main characters who are from Kansas. He speaks slowly and gives each character a slightly different tone, he does a brilliant job. But I still have to say that it is the material in this audio book that makes In Cold Blood amazing.
Kansas City and Olathe, Kansas and many of other landmarks are mentioned in passing In Cold Blood. The people living their lives and then having to live with the horror of four people being murdered in their peaceful community. The details and the conversations make this an amazing book. Every angle of the story is covered. From the criminals themselves to the towns folks sitting around wondering who committed the crime. From the police who make the arrests to the friends and family of everyone even remotely connected to the murder of the Clutters.
At every step of the tale there is a new mystery, a new set of suspenses to ponder over. Who did it? Will they be caught? Will they get the death penalty? Will they actually be killed? The story is told with a lot of direct quotes and is also perfect example of Show, Don’t Tell. Any event that be dramatized is. Where dry narrative could have given us the facts, Truman Capote gives of the heart and soul.
In Cold Blood is a great book.
