Staff Picks
True Crime - Outlaws
- Sara M.
- Thursday, January 10, 2019
Collection
Your money or your life! These books are all about outlaws - highwaymen, pirates, and mutineers. Be prepared to shiver your timbers and reach for the sky!
This list is part of the #BroaderBookshelf2019 reading challenge. Find more lists here.
Real Pirates
The Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship to Pirate Ship
Published in 2007
Explores the role of the Whydah in the slave trade and discusses how it came to be a pirate ship, providing evidence of what life was like for pirates in the Caribbean Area in the 18th century through artifiacts found on the wrecks of pirate ships.
To Hell on a Fast Horse
Billy the Kid, Pat Garrett, and the Epic Chase to Justice in the Old West
Published in 2010
"To Hell on a Fast Horse" re-creates the thrilling manhunt for the Wild West's most iconic outlaw. It is also the first dual biography of the Kid and Garrett, each a larger-than-life figure who would not have become legendary without the other.
Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean
How a Generation of Swashbuckling Jews Carved out an Empire in the New World in Their Quest for Treasure, Religious Freedoms and Revenge
Published in 2008
The Newton Boys
Portrait of an Outlaw Gang
Published in 1994
Information for the book told to Claude Stanush & David Middleton.
The Floating Brothel
The Extraordinary True Story of an Eighteenth-century Ship and Its Cargo of Female Convicts
Published in 2002
If a Pirate I Must Be
The True Story of "Black Bart," King of the Caribbean Pirates
Published in 2007
Outlaws and Highwaymen
The Cult of the Robber in England from the Middle Ages to the Nineteenth Century
Published in 2001
Empire of Blue Water
Captain Morgan's Great Pirate Army, the Epic Battle for the Americas, and the Catastrophe That Ended the Outlaws' Bloody Reign
Published in 2007
Jesse James
The Life, Times, and Treacherous Death of the Most Infamous Outlaw of All Time
Published in 2013
Originally published weeks after his death in 1882 and accompanied by a signed authorization from his wife and mother, describes the gangs and crime sprees that James left in his wake for over a decade.
The Year of Fear
Machine Gun Kelly and the Manhunt That Changed the Nation
Published in 2015
"It's 1933 and Prohibition has given rise to the American gangster--now infamous names like Bonnie and Clyde and John Dillinger. Bank robberies at gunpoint are commonplace and kidnapping for ransom is the scourge of a lawless nation. With local cops unauthorized to cross state lines in pursuit and no national police force, safety for kidnappers is just a short trip on back roads they know well from their bootlegging days. Gangster George "Machine Gun" Kelly and his wife, Kathryn, are some of the most celebrated criminals of the Great Depression. With gin-running operations facing extinction and bank vaults with dwindling stores of cash, Kelly sets his sights on the easy-money racket of kidnapping. His target: rich oilman, Charles Urschel.Enter J. Edgar Hoover, a desperate Justice Department bureaucrat who badly needs a successful prosecution to impress the new administration and save his job. Hoover's agents are given the sole authority to chase kidnappers across state lines and when Kelly bungles the snatch job, Hoover senses his big opportunity. What follows is a thrilling 20,000 mile chase over the back roads of Depression-era America, crossing 16 state lines, and generating headlines across America along the way--a historical mystery/thriller for the ages.Joe Urschel's The Year of Fear is a thrilling true crime story of gangsters and lawmen and how an obscure federal bureaucrat used this now legendary kidnapping case to launch the FBI"-- Provided by publisher.