L.A. Crime: Chronicles of Murder and Mystery from the Entertainment Capital of the World

by Marvin J. Wolf, Katherine Mader

301 pages, Paperback

First published March 16, 1989

About the author

The son of a junkman and a mad housewife (really--she spent half her adult life in mental hospitals), Wolf served 13 years on active duty with the US Army, including a 15-month combat tour in Vietnam. He has worked as a dishwasher, an encyclopedia salesman, a camera store clerk and as a photojournalist with worldwide credits. In 1983, when he regained sole custody of his only child, he put aside his successful career in photojournalism to become an author. A Los Angeles Times bestselling author, Wolf has three times been recognized by the American Society of Journalists and Authors for his professionalism. In 2001, Wolf took a nine-year detour through the movie and television business, an education in writing fiction. One of his screenplays, "Ladies Night," was produced and aired on the USA Network. He returned to writing books and launched a career in fiction in 2010. He lives with his adult daughter in Asheville, NC.

Reviews

[Ana R · Rating 4 out of 5]

Incredibly interesting read! Covers so many captivating true crime stories virtually unheard of today! Plus reading the location information at the end of each chapter and looking up these locations on Google Maps to see not only how the locations have changed since the cases but since the 80s when this was written was amazing!

It’s also a fantastically interesting time capsule of the 80s, in which it was written, not only in the book design but also in some of the outdated terminology. This is my only negative of this book. Some of the terminology to refer to women and poc were quite outdated and reflective of the time, however the content of the book is worth a read with some chapters including moments of history that I was actually shocked to find so little information on the internet about it even now! (Chapter 36 - Stanley Rifkin being a personal highlight in terms of captivating and almost unheard of reads)

Definitely deserves more readers! The content and locations of interest are extremely well structured, very very informative!