I have long been interested in creative nonfiction, which treats nonfiction in a fictional manner. The first such book (novel?) in this field is Truman Capote's In Cold Blood which I am rereading after an interval of thirty years.
Capote himself was an unusual character and not one who might have been expected to write of such horrors as the murders of the Clutter family. When Capote began the research for his book, the murderers, Perry Smith and Dick Hickock had not yet been identified. When the they were captured and the motive revealed, the story became even more chilling than simple local murder which is evil enough on its own.
An interesting side note is that his friend, Harper Lee, helped Capote with the interviews. In Lee's only book, To Kill a Mockingbird, she based the character Dil on Capote as a child.
In 1967, it was made into a grittily realistic movie starring Robert Blake and Scott Wilson and in 1996, a remake was done for television, starring Anthony Edwards (as Hickock) and Eric Roberts (as Smith) to mixed reviews.
There are undertones of homosexuality in the book and according to some, in the original movie.
Born in 1924, Capote died a month before his 60th birthday.
If you have never read In Cold Blood, you can buy the book online.
Joanne
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