New & Coming Soon

Move over, Jersey Devil. A new generation of thrilling—and true!—stories is here to raise South Jersey’s shock factor.

Largely lost to time, these stunners include Atco’s dizzying love dreams, Camden’s underground mystical labyrinth, Glassboro’s UFO frenzy, and the origin of the “cursed” Deptford portion of Route 55. This gripping journey through New Jersey’s southernmost counties also offers views of an escaped show lion, a fatal family love triangle, and the young woman who hoodwinked Camden newspapers before going on to threaten the free world as Nazi propagandist “Axis Sally.”

Local author Danielle L. Burrows collected and researched these happenings and presents them here with detail and aplomb.

Discover the landscapes, culture, and communities that shaped one of the South’s most beloved literary voices through an immersive journey across South Carolina’s storied Lowcountry. From the tidal marshes and historic streets of Charleston to the quiet charm of Beaufort, readers are invited to explore the places that inspired a lifetime of storytelling by Pat Conroy. This engaging history and travel narrative highlights the region’s rich heritage, coastal beauty, and vibrant culture while tracing the author’s deep personal connection to the communities he called home.

Follow the path through beloved Lowcountry destinations including Fripp Island, St. Helena Island, and Daufuskie Island—locations that appear frequently in Conroy’s novels and memoirs. The journey also explores formative chapters of his life, from his time as a cadet at The Citadel to his years teaching in Beaufort County schools and on remote coastal islands.

Blending literary history, regional storytelling, and practical travel inspiration, this richly detailed guide offers readers a unique perspective on the South Carolina Lowcountry. Along the way, it highlights historic landmarks, Gullah Geechee heritage, scenic waterways, renowned coastal cuisine, and authentic local experiences that continue to define this extraordinary region.

Author Lynn Seldon details this unforgettable literary and historical journey through the places, people, and traditions that shaped Conroy’s enduring connection to the Lowcountry.

The infamous 1892 murders of Andrew and Abby Borden have captivated New Englanders for more than one hundred years. But the story doesn’t end in Fall River. Far beyond the locked doors of the Borden household, there is a wider web of people, places, and histories connected to the case. From the investigators who shaped the trial and the reporters who sensationalized it to the key locations that marked Lizzie Borden’s life and lingering legacy, there is a multifaceted history behind one of America's most enduring true crime stories. There are the lives of other remarkable—and often overlooked—figures linked to the Borden bloodline. Among them are Innocent Borden, the recently discovered daughter of Thomas Cornell, a man who was executed in 1673 for the alleged murder of his mother in colonial Rhode Island. And then there’s Sarah Maria Cornell, a millworker and distant cousin of Lizzie, whose mysterious death sparked scandal when a prominent Methodist minister was accused of her murder. By weaving these parallel tales of crime, gender, and societal upheaval into the central narrative, local author Sam Baltrusis takes a deep dive into the ultimate whodunit—placing Lizzie’s story within a broader historical and cultural context of rumors, power, and the shifting expectations of women in American society.

Burbank is known as a haven from the craziness of nearby Hollywood, but the city has a dark underbelly.

Nellie May Madison shot her husband to death at their home in 1934 and became the first woman to be condemned to death in California. The brutal 1953 murder of Mable Monohan inspired an Oscar-winning movie, but that didn’t save Barbara Graham and her killer collaborators from the gallows. In the decades that followed, infamous and violent offenders such as the “Dating Game Killer,” the “Toolbox Killers,” and “Night Stalker” Richard Ramirez hunted for victims in the area, while slayings of detectives, private eyes, bookies, and secret gamblers piled up in the cold case files of the police department.

Award-winning author and journalist James T. Bartlett explores the sinister side of Burbank history.

“Where Oklahoma Began” and the Spirits Linger

Stillwater is a place with its boots planted firmly in different worlds—Cross Timbers and Great Plains, cowboys and Natives, Boomers and gunslingers. Less evident, however, Payne County possesses paranormal peculiarities unseen by the average visitor. Ghostly soldiers persist at the first Civil War battlefield in the state, and phantom students mingle in haunted university halls. From the terrors of Ghost Hollow to glamorous remnants of the oil boom, spectral figures can be found “still pioneering” in “America’s friendliest college town.” Oklahoma folklorist Jeff Provine serves as your guide through the strange, the ethereal, and the whispered-about tales of Payne County.

Reflections, Musings, and Withdrawals

In hunting, “buck fever” strikes when excitement for a big deer makes it hard to shoot straight. For upland hunters, that same surge of adrenaline comes with the thunderous flush of a grouse. But “grouse fever” is more than a fleeting rush—it’s a lasting fixation on all things grouse: the birds, the dogs, the coverts, the literature, and the camaraderie of trusted hunting companions. Author Andrew Marshall Wayment calls Idaho home, where he has spent twenty-five years pursuing five species of grouse: ruffed, dusky, sage, sharp-tailed, and Franklin’s.

Through recollections, essays, and artwork, Andy explores this enduring affliction and affirms his long-held adage: “I never met a grouse I didn’t like.”

Wandering shades, ghost towns, and a phantom train

The Land of Enchantment lives up to its name when it comes to Route 66—and stories of the paranormal. With not one but two paths to explore, the Mother Road winds through New Mexico's mountains and deserts, past ghost towns and thriving cities, and boasts more than its fair share of haunts.

Budville, once a thriving hub and stopover between Albuquerque and Grants, now lies deserted, except, perhaps, for the spirit of the last person to call it home. The whistle of a phantom train can sometimes be heard chugging alongside the highway in Tucumcari, and in Glenrio, an abandoned town that straddles the New Mexico–Texas border, the spirit of a murder victim is rumored to inhabit one of the last buildings standing.

Even the New Mexico Mining Museum plays host to the spirits of miners who once worked in the uranium capital of the world, and in Gallup, the Hotel El Rancho boasts not just Hollywood credentials but tales of otherworldly encounters.

Author Sundee Perkins explores the spooky twists and turns of New Mexico’s Route 66.

Gone and not forgotten—strange ways Ohioans have met their maker.

Ohio has given us sports legends, world-changing inventors, icons of industry, a wealth of famous artists of all stripes, and eight presidents. It’s also given us ghosts, ghouls, grave robbers, the prematurely buried, historic murders, colorful demises (including death by defective outhouse), those who predicted their own deaths with uncanny accuracy, the violent Wayne County poltergeist, petrified bodies, the Seneca County exploding corpse, obsessive-compulsive Jonathan Ward’s murder-dismemberment of Mrs. Ward, and the faces of way too many dead people appearing in windows.

Light a candle, wrap yourself in a shawl, and join author Keven McQueen and illustrator Addy Atchity on a macabre tour of Ohioans who took a memorable exit. 

Missing Persons, Doomsday Cults and Shifting Sands.

Though it may look as pure as the driven snow, White Sands is bathed in the blood of the dead whose bones lie hidden beneath the dunes. 

Still waiting to be found in the sea of gypsum is Albert Fountain, who vanished from the face of the earth in 1896 along with his eight-year-old son. Long before that, the spirit of Pavla Blanca searched for her conquistador lover in the form of swirling sand, mysterious giant footprints rose from the earth at Alkali Flats, and a sorcerer met his end near the spot that Spaceport America stands today. 

Elsewhere, the ghostly Rebecca haunts The Lodge at Cloudcroft, a long-dead hermit lights a fire from his den in the Organ Mountains, and a witch is still trying to claw her way out of a Mesilla cemetery. 

John LeMay and Donna Blake Birchell unearth the buried spirits of White Sands National Park, White Sands Missile Range, and nearby settlements. 

The landscape of Connecticut is diverse, from coastal beaches to picturesque lakes and cozy, quaint villages with a rich historical and cultural heritage. In every city or town is a graveyard with a compelling story to tell carved in stone. From grinning skulls to massive marble mausoleums, Roxie Zwicker takes readers on a tour of the state from shore to hillside, uncovering mysterious tales of people who were thought to be witches in the early 1600s to stories of Revolutionary heroes. From the famous P.T. Barnum to the anonymous numbered dead of the Connecticut Valley Hospital, there are stories that need to be told. Ghost stories linger in many of these gardens of stone, perhaps as a connection to an unquiet past.

Revisit a critical and little-known piece of WWII history that had a profound impact on Illinois and the nation.

During WWII, the United States was home to almost half a million POW's—German, Italian, and Japanese soldiers captured overseas and then brought to the United States. The POWs were housed in various large camps set up in forty-four of the nation's then forty-eight states. One of those states was Illinois. At its peak, Illinois housed three major base camps and twenty branch camps, stretching from the Rockford-Chicago area down to Camp Pomona, near Murphysboro. When not housed in these camps, POW's were put to work, on the state's farms and in its factories, to alleviate the country's serious wartime labor shortages. By the end of the war, there was no part of Illinois that was not touched by these prisoners of war.

Author Cary O'Dell sheds light on a largely forgotten element of home front WWII history. 

Meet the unusual creatures of the Pacific Northweird.

The Pacific Northwest is a land of secrets, legends, and some might even say monsters. Stories of cryptids—hidden animals—are whispered throughout the region’s history, told in everything from bashful confidences to bold headlines.

Unusual creatures like the Cadborosaurus have been sighted in the Salish Sea, and the Pend Oreille Paddler is rumored to live inland, lurking deep in still waters. It’s said that one can sometimes catch a glimpse of a hulking bat-humanoid winging its way across gray skies, and the rugged Pacific Coast could be hiding more scaled, tailed, finned and furred sea cryptids in remote harbors. The foggy forests, thick with evergreens, are said to hide everything from an arboreal octopus to the king of cryptids, Sasquatch.

Peppered with historic and contemporary newspaper articles, expert interviews by cryptozoologists and cryptid enthusiasts, and retellings of local legends, author and professional weirdo Devon Kelley uncovers the hidden creatures of Cascadia.   

Learn the history of one of the oldest Black churches in the United States.

The First Baptist Church of Williamsburg, Virginia, stands as a living monument to the enduring power and resilience of its congregation. Beginning in the hush harbors on plantations owned by Virginia’s most powerful leadership, First Baptist emerged as a powerful force, inextricably linking religious salvation and education as tools of liberation and agency for Africans in America. The church was involved in the American Revolution and the Civil War, thus sealing its place as a key player in Williamsburg. Through the antebellum period, Reconstruction, and modern times, First Baptist and its congregation also resisted the growth of slavery, the dissipation of the rights of free Black people, and the removal of Black-owned homes and businesses.

A powerful icon for freedom, resilience, and hope, the church reflects the larger story of Black voices in Virginia and America.

Veteran guide and creator of the popular Sinners and Scandals of Laurel Hill Cemetery tour, Thomas H. Keels tells the spellbinding stories of thirteen unforgettable characters and unfolds Laurel Hill’s special place in Quaker City history.

Upon its founding in 1836, Laurel Hill Cemetery became the place to spend eternity for many of Philadelphia’s great and good, but alongside the luminaries interred in this Victorian necropolis lie shadier figures.

Philadelphia girl Mabel Tinley became one of the biggest grifters in Gay Nineties New York. Civil War general Henry Morris Naglee was denounced in the press as “a slayer of innocence and a robber of chastity.” The grisly death of Martha Drinnan, spinster daughter of the cemetery superintendent, remains an enduring mystery.

Veteran guide and creator of the popular Sinners and Scandals of Laurel Hill Cemetery tour Thomas H. Keels tells the spellbinding stories of thirteen unforgettable characters and reveals Laurel Hill's special place in Quaker City history.

Beyond the sun-drenched beaches and historic charm of Florida’s Atlantic shoreline lies a darker history—one shaped by restless spirits, unsolved mysteries, and stories that refuse to fade. Along this coast, tales of hauntings and paranormal encounters weave through centuries of local lore, blending real history with the unexplained. From the yellow fever epidemic of 1821 to eerie accounts of revenants, mediums, and psychic communities, the region is steeped in legends that challenge logic and invite curiosity.

Explore a coastal town known for psychics and spiritual seekers, and step inside a renowned college said to be haunted by a powerful industrialist, his mistress, and a child whose presence lingers long after death. Discover chilling rumors surrounding Cold War experiments in a grand seaside hotel, where whispers claim that government research crossed unseen boundaries with terrifying consequences. Visit a historic theater where one seat mysteriously folds itself down each night and remains untouched until the curtain falls. Follow the unsettling final transmission tied to Flight 19 and the enduring mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, where vanished aviators left behind questions that still echo today.

Blending Florida history, paranormal investigation, and true ghost stories, this collection is perfect for readers who love haunted travel, supernatural legends, and unexplained phenomena rooted in real places. Both atmospheric and deeply researched, these accounts reveal a coastline where beauty and mystery coexist—the past may be closer than you think. Author Thomas Smith details these stories and more in a haunting collection.

November 13, 1925, marked the third miserably cold and dreary day on the campus of Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. Early that morning the girls at Park House made a horrible discovery. A senior girl, Jeanne Robeson, lay dead on the floor of her kitchenette, the apparent victim of gas asphyxiation.

Later that afternoon, a second tragedy loomed as the girls at Clark House became aware that one of their housemates was missing. Alice Corbett of Utica, New York, walked away from Clark House and simply vanished. Her disappearance was front-page news in every paper in the northeast. 

With the death of one girl on campus and the disappearance of another, the press at first speculated that the two cases were somehow connected. The police, on the other hand, had other theories to investigate: was the Alice Corbett case a suicide, a runaway or an elopement? Did she suffer a nervous breakdown due to academic difficulties, or was her personal life dealt a staggering blow by a onetime boyfriend? 

Join author James M. Greiner as he unravels the details behind this cold case. 

Evil on the Edge of the Edwards Plateau

Darkness lurks in the shadows of the seemingly unspoiled country around Devils River. A sadistic murder of a Mexican American teenager in 1953 and the demented slaughter of a Mexican American family in 1968 have remained unsolved for decades. Both vicious slayings were linked by geography, prejudice, and perversity. Both atrocities were committed at the intersection of race, class, and entitlement. The community and key law enforcement personnel avoided accountability and looked the other way. As a result, the victims’ memories and the identities of the depraved perpetrators were confined to whispers.

A reckoning is long overdue, and award-winning author E.R. Bills's investigative efforts deliver the impetus. The devils were simply in the details.

With over 250 years of history, Fauquier County’s old homes and Civil War sites vibrate with ghostly energy.

Spectral figures haunt the old grounds of Grace Church. A headless ghost and a white calf appear in Throughfare Gap. The spirit of a whistling Confederate soldier appears in a home near St. Stephens, and Colonel Mosby’s wife, Pauline, has been seen wandering her home at Brentmoor. The Grey Lady of Avenel wanders through the woods to Kinloch, and the shades of the Nourse family and their caretaker, Eliza Redd, still make themselves known at Weston.

Join local historian Meaghan Reddick as she delves between the seen and the unseen worlds of Fauquier’s historic haunts. 

From the author of Murder in Victorian Western Michigan and Victorian Southwest Michigan True Crime comes more thrilling stories from the Wolverine State's past.

As the Michigan Central Railroad company became a juggernaut, the nineteenth-century rail line also devolved into a bastion for crime as morality was often set aside for profit. In 1850, a grand jury indicted fifty men in Jackson County for conspiracy to commit arson after a freight depot in Detroit was set ablaze. When two Grand Trunk locomotives collided in Battle Creek in 1893 killing twenty-seven people, a conductor and an engineer each accused the other, avoiding conviction. A Mineral Ridge train robbery of $70,000 in payroll money destined for miners on the Keweenaw Peninsula was exposed by a former railroad worker involved in the heist, allowing him to escape prosecution and sending four others to prison.

Author Michael Delaware unfolds dark stories of corruption and crime from Michigan’s Victorian age.

Dark history lives beneath Georgia’s southern charm. In this gripping work of Georgia true crime history, veteran journalist Neely Young investigates the Peach State’s most chilling stories of crime, corruption, racial violence, and injustice. Blending narrative journalism with deep historical research, this book reveals the hidden side of Georgia history—where power, prejudice, and profit often collided with law and conscience.

Travel to July 11, 1964, when U.S. Army reservist Colonel Lemuel Penn became the victim of a shocking Ku Klux Klan murder on the Broad River Bridge, an act of civil rights era racial terror that helped galvanize national outrage. Step back to 1873 and the violent world of Reconstruction-era Georgia, where a young Doc Holliday was linked to deadly clashes long before becoming the legendary gunfighter of Tombstone fame. Through stories of mob vigilantism, political corruption, backroom deals, lawmen, outlaws, and unsolved crimes, Young uncovers the events that shaped the state’s darker legacy.

Perfect for fans of Southern true crime, American crime history, and historical crime nonfiction, this book offers a compelling look at real crimes that influenced culture, justice, and memory. Readers interested in civil rights history, historical murders, and true crime books about the American South will find a powerful blend of investigative storytelling and historical insight.

From hidden archives to notorious crime scenes, these unforgettable accounts show how the echoes of Georgia’s violent past still resonate today.

Read about the crime The Post-Tribune of Northwest Indiana called "the most reckless holdup and murder ever committed within the boundaries of Lake County.”

It all started with a haphazard robbery in a popular roadhouse halfway between Cedar Lake and Crown Point. Close to midnight, a hardened crew of bootleggers from the South Side of Chicago stalked into the crowded barroom. Fifteen terrifying minutes later, bullet holes cratered the walls, patrons were left bloody and dazed, and a prominent Lake County attorney lay dying. The mayhem would spark a furious and desperate police response, an unprecedented trial, and even more brutal murder.

Author James Haniford takes readers back to Prohibition-era Indiana for a front-row seat to the unbelievable true story of big-city crime in a small resort town.

Facts, Fiction & Tales of the Town Too Tough to Die

The desert oasis of Tombstone has reinvented itself many times over the course of the last century. From the boomtown heyday in the 1880s to its decline and reinvention as an icon of the Wild West, its reputation was built on colorful characters and even more colorful stories.

At its height, Tombstone was a town full of swinging saloons, bawdy brothels, and miners hanging their futures on extracting silver from the unforgiving landscape. Following close behind them were cold-blooded outlaws like the Cowboy gang and the legendary lawman Wyatt Earp, whose exploits live on in both myth and memory.

Doc Holliday’s outsized reputation was forged in part by Tombstone and the iconic gunfight in which he took part, and beneath Big Nose Kate’s Saloon, the ghost of the Swamper, who secretly dug into the mine shafts to steal the silver for himself, still roams.

Even the naming of Tombstone is linked to the larger-than-life story of prospector Ed Schieffelin. A soldier once mocked him with the words "all you'll find out there is your tombstone,” but in 1877, when Ed struck it lucky in the Arizona desert, a legend was born.

Join author Richard Estep as he untangles the truth from fiction in Tombstone.

The Dark Side of the Palmetto State   

With a rich history dating back to 1788 and beyond—including pirates, war, secession, death, debauchery, and disease—South Carolina is home to many legends. Read about the ghost of a small child that wanders a historic home in York. Witness the strange occurrences that have happened for years at the Newberry Opera House. Learn about the site of a massacre in Long Canes that still holds the remnants of its victims. See a train depot in Belton that’s called the most haunted place in the state. Author John G. Clark Jr. walks readers down a tightrope between the world as it exists today and the dark past and side of South Carolina. 

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Explore a true crime mystery from the Tube City.

Local socialite La Roux Soles’ hometown of McKeesport spoke her name in whispers. She and her husband Bob, a charming war hero and successful businessman, lived it up with boozy prohibition parties in their mansion perched high above the National Tube Works, the industrial heart of the gritty town. Behind the façade, Bob harbored secrets that shattered them both, drove her mad, and pushed her to commit the ultimate act of desperation—or was it murder? Like grime from the steel mill cloaking their mansion windows, the real story of that warm June night in 1933 was obscured. The mysterious events left a scar upon McKeesport that never quite healed and soon captured the nation’s attention.

Local author and historian Lisa Speranza exhumes the heart of the scandal, unraveling an almost century-old story that time nearly forgot.

An enduring feedback loop where belief masquerades as evidence and credibility becomes collateral damage.

In April 1966, police officers in rural Ohio and western Pennsylvania chased a glowing object across eighty miles of back roads. The encounter—silent, blinding, and seemingly intelligent—became one of the most famous UFO cases in American history and helped inspire the opening scenes of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. But the mystery didn’t end when the lights vanished. Drawing on primary sources, official records, and personal experience, this book traces how a single night’s events were transformed into lasting folklore—shaped not just by witnesses and the media, but by the U.S. military’s own investigative machinery. Rather than merely asking what the police chased, a more unsettling question is asked here: how did government involvement, belief, and mistrust combine to create a self-perpetuating legend that still echoes today?

Author Michael Kishbucher, a career Air Force and Defense Intelligence Agency officer, revisits this strange Appalachian legend from an uncommon perspective: from within the intelligence community itself.

The infamous 1892 murders of Andrew and Abby Borden have captivated New Englanders for over one hundred years. But the story doesn’t end in Fall River. Far beyond the locked doors of the Borden household there is a wider web of people, places, and histories connected to the case. From the investigators who shaped the trial and the reporters who sensationalized it, to the key locations that marked Lizzie Borden’s life and lingering legacy, there is a multifaceted history behind one of America's most enduring true crime stories. There are the lives of other remarkable—and often overlooked—figures linked to the Borden bloodline. Among them are Innocent Borden, the recently discovered daughter of Thomas Cornell, a man who was executed in 1673 for the alleged murder of his mother in colonial Rhode Island. And then there’s Sarah Maria Cornell, a mill worker and distant cousin of Lizzie, whose mysterious death sparked scandal when a prominent Methodist minister was accused of her murder. By weaving these parallel tales of crime, gender, and societal upheaval into the central narrative, local author Sam Baltrusis takes a deep dive into the ultimate whodunit—placing Lizzie’s story within a broader historical and cultural context of rumors, power, and the shifting expectations of women in American society.

Lover's of Ohio history and presidential history will love this exploration of William H. Taft, one of Cincinnati’s favorite sons.

Most Americans know that William Howard Taft was President of the United States and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. But his life and legacy contain much beyond that—especially in his hometown.

He fought to put crooks away in court, and he fought for ethics and integrity. He made judgements that made him unpopular. Beyond the law, he and his wife Nellie were influential in the city’s arts and culture, including the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. For all of this and more, he is remembered today as one of the Queen City’s greatest citizens.

After years studying Taft’s career in Cincinnati, Brian Planitz brings to life Taft’s time in his birthplace and how it shaped his later career in Washington D.C. and around the world.

For eighty-five years, Porteous, Mitchell & Braun stood guard in the heart of Portland, Maine’s Congress Street commercial district.

Founded in 1873, the firm spent its first three decades in Norwich, Connecticut, before it took over a failing department store in Maine’s largest city and became a beloved shopping tradition. Porteous was home to Portland’s Santa Claus, and its elaborate Christmas displays were a holiday destination for northern New Englanders. By the late 1970s, Porteous had expanded and opened branch locations throughout Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont. As the retail industry experienced mergers and consolidations, the family-run Porteous bucked the trend and remained in operation longer than many of its former competitors. Although its Portland store closed in 1991, its iconic building has been creatively transformed into the Maine College of Art & Design.

Through interviews with residents, dignitaries, and former employees, and dozens of rarely seen photographs, department store historian Michael J. Lisicky recalls the time when the community knew "You’ll Enjoy Shopping at Porteous."

What began as a humble Christmas Eve meal became a story of heritage, resilience, and rediscovery.

Every December, the Feast of the Seven Fishes Festival brings to life the rich holiday tradition of La Vigilia as it journeyed from Southern Italy to the heart of Appalachia, where immigrant families transformed a sacred seafood supper into a vibrant expression of identity and community. It all began when a forgotten family feast was revived in a coal-town kitchen and a grassroots festival grew into a beloved regional celebration—eventually inspiring an unlikely comic strip and a feature film.

Blending cultural history with deeply personal storytelling, Shannon Colaianni Tinnell captures the laughter, labor, and love behind an enduring Christmas ritual while offering over one hundred authentic, time-honored recipes drawn from more than twenty years of Festival Cucina. Warm, vivid, and unforgettable, this is more than a book about food—it’s a celebration of the stories we carry and the meals that keep them alive.

Politics and power in Gold Rush California

At the north end of a quiet neighborhood in Daly City lies a historical marker noting the site of California's most infamous—and deadly—duel. The San Francisco of 1859 had grown rapidly, with treasure seekers from all corners of the globe converging to find their own fortune, either through prospecting or, more lucratively, catering to the needs of those prospectors. 

Out of the muddy streets and the chaos, two leaders emerged whose actions would have an outsized influence on the course of American politics for decades. David S. Terry, the chief justice of the California Supreme Court, and U.S. Senator David Broderick were both determined to steer the fate of the new state, but in very different directions. At the heart of their rivalry lay the fight against slavery, with Senator Broderick advocating for California to remain a free state. 

On September 13, 1859, their arguments came to a head in a duel that ended with Senator Broderick shot and mortally wounded. He died three days later, but the outcome would haunt David Terry for another thirty years. 

Author William E. Hammonds explores the twists and turns of the duel for the future of Gold Rush California.

On a cold February morning in 1990, a commuter driving Georgia Highway 190 near Pine Mountain made a discovery that would haunt Harris and Meriwether Counties for years: a young man, barely alive, abandoned on the roadside with brutal injuries that didn’t match any “accident.” What first looked like a hit-and-run quickly unraveled into something darker—an organized act of violence tied to the cocaine trade, barroom power, and a crew that believed fear was currency. Follow the death of Paul McKeen Jr. from the first 911 call through the long, grinding years of false stories, intimidation, and silence. As investigators dug past staged explanations, witnesses began to crack: ex-girlfriends, ex-wives, frightened associates, and reluctant insiders finally admitted what they heard, what they saw, and what the men involved bragged about afterward. The case became a test of whether justice can survive when physical evidence is thin—but human truth keeps surfacing. Author Clay Bryant traces the path from roadside mystery to indictments, pretrial strategy, and a high-stakes trial built on testimony, pattern, and motive.

Explore a true crime mystery from the Tube City.

Local socialite La Roux Soles’s hometown of McKeesport, Pennsylvania, spoke her name in whispers. She and her husband, Bob, a charming war hero and successful businessman, lived it up with boozy Prohibition-era parties in their mansion perched high above the National Tube Works, the industrial heart of the gritty town. Behind the facade, Bob harbored secrets that shattered them both, drove her mad, and pushed her to commit the ultimate act of desperation—or was it murder? Like grime from the steel mill cloaking their mansion's windows, the real story of that warm June night in 1933 was obscured. The mysterious events left a scar on McKeesport that never quite healed and soon captured the nation’s attention.

Local author and historian Lisa Speranza exhumes the heart of the scandal, unraveling an almost century-old story that time nearly forgot.

Explore the true story of a famous crime that inspired Anatomy of a Murder

Just after midnight on July 31, 1952, U.S. Army Lieutenant Coleman A. Peterson walked into the Lumberjack Tavern in Big Bay, Michigan, and shot Mike Chenoweth in retaliation for an assault on his wife. This revenge killing rocked the small lumber town in the Upper Peninsula, and the trial that followed inspired a best-selling novel and an Academy Award–nominated motion picture, Anatomy of a Murder.

Using the testimony taken from trial transcripts, the police investigator, and the killer, author Patrick J. Baker shares the real story of a sensational murder trial that captivated the Midwest and the aftermath that drew the eyes of the nation.

Explore the Rich History of the Hudson Valley

The Hudson Valley is more than just scenic vistas—it is the birthplace of American history. Go beyond the traditional guidebook to counties nestled along the east and west banks of the majestic Hudson River. From Native American settlements and Dutch colonial roots to the rise of the English, history unfolds at every turn in the river.

 Discover Newburgh, where Washington had his longest headquarters of the Revolution. Explore the quaint town of Kingston, home of the state’s first capital. Learn how the pivotal Battle of Saratoga turned the tide of the American Revolution. Admire the artistic heritage of Frederic Church’s Olana, the vast Gilded Age estates, and the nation’s first presidential library in Hyde Park. Enjoy a day exploring Kykuit, the Rockefeller Estate, in Tarrytown or the railroad depot in Peekskill where President-elect Lincoln stopped to speak on the way to his inauguration.

 Join local historian A.J. Schenkman as he traces the forgotten histories and vibrant heritage of one of America’s most historic regions.

Lakeside Inn is the nucleus of Mount Dora that offers the legacy of frontier Florida. An adventurous and courageous team of pioneers formed a partnership to erect a hotel that was spearheaded by attorney Colonel John M. Alexander, who recruited newcomers to visit and relocate to Central Florida. The partnership of Alexander with Colonel MacDonald and Donnelly family contributed to the early vision of a Florida Inn.

The flourishing orange culture and the intellectual components of Chautauqua shaped the evolving communities and influenced the historic and artistic spirit of modern-day Mount Dora.

Traditionally a seasonal hotel, the recreational oasis is sought after year-round by visitors and organizations who can glimpse a hint of the Gilded age and marvel at the experiences of legendary guests.

Explore the true story of a famous crime that inspired Anatomy of a Murder

Just after midnight on July 31, 1952, Army Lieutenant Coleman A. Petersen walked into the Lumberjack Tavern in Big Bay, Michigan, and shot Mike Chenoweth in retaliation for an assault on his wife. This revenge killing rocked the small lumber town in the Upper Peninsula, and the trial that followed inspired a best-selling novel and an Academy Award–nominated motion picture, Anatomy of a Murder.

Using the testimony taken from trial transcripts, the police investigator, and the killer, author Patrick J. Baker shares the real story of a sensational murder trial that captivated the Midwest and the aftermath that drew the eyes of the nation.

Hot springs, notorious criminals, and Presidential visits. 

For over a century, Glenwood Springs has attracted visitors from all walks of life with its sweeping vistas, hot springs, and luxury accommodations. 

Nestled in the Rocky Mountains where the Roaring Fork River meets the Grand River, it initially drew in prospectors and their families who decided to stay. Walter Devereis was the first to recognize the commercial potential of the mineral waters the Ute Indians considered sacred, building the world's largest health resort and spa alongside the Hotel Colorado. The wealthy and notorious followed close behind. 

Theodore Roosevelt hunted mountain lions and bears in the rough country and stayed in the hotel so often it was nicknamed “the little White House of the West,” while Doc Holliday came in the hopes that the hot springs would improve his health. The speakeasy boom during Prohibition attracted high-profile gangsters like Al Capone and Diamond Jack Altieri, who swaggered around town in a flashy cowboy outfit and $30,000 in diamonds. 

Join author Nancy K. Williams as she recounts stories of the famous—and infamous—people who left their mark on Glenwood Springs. 

New Jersey is American music.

Between 1980 and 2010, Garden State music transformed from the soul-infused “Jersey Sound” into a worldwide powerhouse for stadium rock, indie rock, thrash metal, and hardcore. From the bars of the Shore to the basements of New Brunswick, thousands of bands emerged. And this book tries to list them all! Global icons like Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi, Blues Traveler, and My Chemical Romance and underground legends like Overkill, Adrenalin O.D., the Wrens, and everything in between—it’s all here. No act is too small, and no scene is left behind.

Supported by a curated collective of guest writers, Michael Gilligan navigates this chaotic journey with humor and insider perspective and offers the ultimate tribute to great state of New Jersey.

Sift through nearly forgotten and altogether fascinating elements from two hundred years of Hoosier history.

A lost river flows in—and under—Southern Indiana. The ghostly remains of a defunct ordnance plant in LaPorte County bely the industriousness of the six thousand men and women who worked there at its height to support the home front effort during World War II. Balloonists delighted Hoosier crowds in the days before the airplane, and Studebakers roared along on the Studebaker proving grounds just west of South Bend.

From the long history of Indiana’s coal industry to the construction of the state’s first railroad, author Edward J. Fujawa offers a fresh angle on the well-known while unearthing remarkable and obscure tales from two centuries of Indiana history.

One Deadly Time in the Old Dominion

Violence and lawlessness plagued late nineteenth-and early twentieth-century Virginia, and with no bureau of investigation or state police force, the Old Dominion relied on the Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency to solve a multitude of crimes.

Formed by William G. Baldwin and Thomas L. Felts, the agency, headquartered in Roanoke, was charged with investigating some of the state’s most sensational murder cases. Among these were the brutal killing of Fannie McCue, wife of the former mayor of Charlottesville; the slaughter of a mountain family in Buchanan County; the shotgunning of Louise Beattie, the young wife of a wealthy Richmond playboy; and the unprecedented shootout in the Carroll County courthouse that left five dead.

Author and historian Phillip Andrew Gibbs recounts how the Agency’s detectives who worked these cases succeeded in bringing some of the state’s most heinous criminals to justice.

Step back in time to experience mountain Maryland in all its strange and vibrant glory.

From its fascinating caves, dangerous mines, and mysterious mountains to the hex magic practitioners and spooky tales that haunt its towns, folklore infuses every hill and hollow of Western Maryland. Prepare to meet the colorful characters who kept life exciting in Maryland’s westernmost counties, like the locals who never met a poisonous snake they didn’t love and a well-read twentieth-century cave dweller. Travel historic highways and byways straight into frontier Maryland’s darkest history, where an axe murderer cleaved the peaceful mountain night in 1830 and a little-known monster lurks in a place ominously called Spook Hollow.

Join local historian Susan Fair on a tour through obscure and spooky places in the beautiful mountain regions of the Old Line State. 

An enduring feedback loop where belief masquerades as evidence and credibility becomes collateral damage.

In April 1966, police officers in rural Ohio and Western Pennsylvania chased a glowing object across eighty miles of back roads. The object—silent, blinding, and seemingly intelligent—became one of the most famous UFO cases in American history and helped inspire the opening scenes of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. But the mystery didn’t end when the lights vanished. Drawing on primary sources, official records, and personal experience, this book traces how a single night’s events were transformed into lasting folklore—shaped not just by witnesses and the media, but by the U.S. military’s own investigative machinery. Rather than merely asking what the police chased, a more unsettling question is asked here: how did government involvement, belief, and mistrust combine to create a self-perpetuating legend that still echoes today?

Author Michael Kishbucher, a career U.S. Air Force and Defense Intelligence Agency officer, revisits this strange Appalachian legend from an uncommon perspective: from within the intelligence community itself.

Thirteen Master Carvers. One Enduring Legacy

For generations, Cherokee people in North Carolina shaped their world with their hands. Every object needed to live, work, and gather—from tools to ceremonial items—was made through practiced skill and shared knowledge. Rooted in an oral tradition, Cherokee history is preserved not primarily through written records, but through material culture. These objects stand as living evidence of belief systems, values, and continuity passed from one generation to the next.

Wood carving occupies a vital place within this tradition. Although time, environmental loss, and forced disruption have erased much early archaeological evidence, the knowledge itself endured. Unlike many craft traditions that faded with the rise of mass-produced goods, Cherokee carving remained a respected and active practice. Hand skill, technique, and cultural meaning continued to be valued, refined, and taught.

Pipes, masks, figures, sculpture, and bas-relief carvings from the early twentieth century to the present illustrate the depth, craftsmanship, and cultural meaning of Cherokee carving traditions. Each piece was made with intention—whether functional, ceremonial, or ornamental—and reflects a deep connection between the maker and the community. These carvings are expressive and tactile, shaped by both personal vision and shared heritage.

Biographical profiles explore the lives and creative paths of thirteen accomplished Cherokee carvers, offering insight into their training, influences, and responsibilities as cultural bearers. Together, the works and stories presented form a clear record of Cherokee carving as a living tradition—one defined by resilience, innovation, and mastery.

Anna Fariello is a cultural curator and researcher who, through Curatorial insight, has organized more than forty museum exhibitions, heritage sites, and archival collections documenting traditional craft and material culture.

Explore the story of a city under martial law during the Civil War

The day after Virginia’s secession in May 1861, Union troops marched from Washington to occupy its neighbor Alexandria. A former powerhouse in the slave trade, Alexandria was the first Confederate city in Virginia to be occupied during the Civil War, and it was governed under strict martial law. Overnight, this bustling urban town on the Potomac River transformed into a center of disease, death, and debauchery. Viewing all residents as potential threats regardless of allegiance, the military government resorted to heavy-handed actions to control its transient soldier population, counteract civilian opposition, combat waves of gunshot wounds and illness, and imprison those deemed disloyal to the Union cause.

Drawing upon true accounts of civilian and soldier experiences, historian Madeline Feierstein explores whether Union authorities kept order within the city or watched it fall into chaos. 

How Food Became a Point of Pride

For more than a century, hickory smoke has shaped the identity of Lexington, North Carolina. Long before food television and festivals, pit fires burned behind canvas tents and small-town joints, giving rise to what the world now knows as Lexington-style barbecue—slow-cooked pork, kissed by wood smoke, served with tomato-based dip and red slaw, passed down through generations of hardworking families.

Author Caleb Sink takes readers inside the true heart of North Carolina barbecue history, tracing the evolution of Lexington-style barbecue from its earliest pioneers to the legendary restaurants and pitmasters who carried the tradition forward. Learn the human story behind the pits—of families like the Monks, Conrads, and Stameys, and of countless unnamed workers whose labor built a culinary legacy.

Get a place at the table for a cultural history of barbecue in Lexington NC, exploring how a simple sandwich became a point of civic pride, a tourist destination, and a symbol of resilience. Along the way, readers encounter friendly rivalries, vanishing icons, presidential visits, and the annual Lexington Barbecue Festival that draws over 100,000 visitors each year.

Meet the unusual creatures of the Pacific Northweird.

The Pacific Northwest is a land of secrets, legends, and some might even say monsters. Stories of cryptids—hidden animals—are whispered throughout the region’s history, told in everything from bashful confidences to bold headlines.

Unusual creatures like the Cadborosaurus have been sighted in the Salish Sea, and the Pend Oreille Paddler is rumored to live inland, lurking deep in still waters. It’s said that one can sometimes catch a glimpse of a hulking bat-humanoid winging its way across gray skies, and the rugged Pacific coast could be hiding more scaled, tailed, finned, and furred sea cryptids in remote harbors. The foggy forests, thick with evergreens, are said to hide everything from an arboreal octopus to the king of cryptids, Sasquatch.

Through historic and contemporary newspaper articles, expert interviews by cryptozoologists and cryptid enthusiasts, and retellings of local legends, author and professional weirdo Devon Kelley uncovers the hidden creatures of Cascadia.   

Lover's of Ohio history and presidential history will love this exploration of William H. Taft, one of Cincinnati’s favorite sons.

Most Americans know that William Howard Taft was president of the United States and chief justice of the Supreme Court. But his life and legacy contain much beyond that, especially in his hometown.

He fought to put crooks away in court, and he fought for ethics and integrity. He made judgements that made him unpopular. Beyond the law, he and his wife, Nellie, were influential in the city’s arts and culture, including the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. For all of this and more, he is remembered today as one of the Queen City’s greatest citizens.

After years studying Taft’s career in Cincinnati, Brian Planitz brings to life Taft’s time in his birthplace and how it shaped his later career in Washington, D.C., and around the world.

Murder, Myth, and Memory in Cascadia.

Before the states of Oregon and Washington, the Pacific Northwest already had a reputation as a place with a dark and sometimes mysterious history. 

Whispers of strange noises, oddities, and sightings of the unnatural become part of the area's folklore, hoping to find meaning for the suffering of those who came before. More than two thousand ships have been lost off the coast, along with an untold number of lives, and the suffering of those on the Oregon Trail has been well recounted. The Columbia River, meandering through the heart of the territory, has been the site of countless disappearances and deaths. 

From the decimation of Native tribes to racist settlement laws and anti-Chinese sentiment, the Pacific Northwest has long struggled to reconcile the present with the past. 

Join author and historian Ira Wesley Kitmacher as he explores the dark history of Oregon and Washington and the stories that reverberate through time.

Ghostly reverberations pulse for eternity in the most haunted crime scenes in Chicago.

The rat-a-tat of machine guns echoes at the site of Al Capone's St. Valentine's Day Massacre. The ghost of Louisa Luetgert makes the occasional appearance on the grounds of the old Luetgert Sausage and Packing Company—her husband, the “Sausage King,” cooked her down in a vat of meat tenderizer in 1897. Ghostly screams ring out and dogs get their hackles up at the site of serial killer H.H. Holmes's “Murder Castle” on West 63rd Street. Hundreds died at the Iroquois Theatre fire in 1903—inspectors had overlooked violations that made the venue on West Randolph Street a veritable tinderbox. Today, passersby are greeted by cold spots and pleas for help from the long-dead and perpetually tortured. The City with Broad Shoulders is burdened by souls whose lives were stolen and are seemingly in pursuit of justice and comfort—or perhaps vengeance. Author Eva Pilch guides readers on a citywide tour of the most haunted crime scenes in Chicago.

The Huguenot heritage in the United States cannot be overstated. In the latter part of the sixteenth century, France was plunged into a series of religious wars. In 1589, Henry of Navarre became Henry IV of France, but peace was not achieved until he issued the Edict of Nantes in 1598, which recognized the Huguenots’ right to worship in the towns they controlled. While Henry IV lived, the financial and military security of the country was ensured. After his assassination in 1610, it ceased.

Religious persecution resumed, and in 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes, and many French Protestants fled. Of the estimated 180,000 Huguenot refugees, approximately 3,000 crossed the Atlantic. This book is about their descendants and their influence on the development of the American republic and the rights enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.

The Huguenot Church in Charleston, a national landmark, is the last Huguenot church in America.

Flung down a well. Buried alive in the backwoods. Gunned down in broad daylight.

Not what you’d expect from a place flocked to by influencers for its cozy aesthetic and iconic fall foliage. 

Whether the crimes were intricately plotted or born of passion, Vermont’s history is filled with lawlessness, depravity, and murder. 

Some culprits struck just once, some went on a spree, while others using opportunism and cunning menaced entire regions for years. 

From the place Vermont calls “The Kingdom” to its “Marble City,” Thea Lewis, author of True Crime Stories of Burlington, Vermont, offers up more than a century of mayhem, with double lives, serial killers, and a plot to slay a beloved pop star with a global fan base. 

Join her as she peels back the region’s reputation for wholesomeness and rural charm to show you the darker side of the Green Mountain State.  

Ghoulish Legends from The City of Lakes

Haunted government buildings, theaters, museums, restaurants, parks, and, of course, cemeteries—Minneapolis has it all. Local folklore comes to life at the Turnblad Mansion, where the piano plays on its own, and at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, where the subjects of portraits move about. Spirits of victims in the disastrous 1878 mill explosion haunt Mill Ruins Park. The Foshay Tower’s elevator seemingly goes haywire for no reason, and inmates and guards in the Hennepin County Jail report sightings of an underdressed spectral figure.

Local author Ron de Beaulieu investigates the roots of the Mill City’s ghost stories, ranging from the tragic to the horrific as well as heartwarming and perplexing. 

Some Illinois travelers are so taken by their destination, they hunker down for eternity.

There’s something about old hotels and locales that tourists flock to. The places are experiences unto themselves, but they also thrum, sometimes quite literally, with the lingering presence of those who previously paid them a visit. At the Mineral Springs Hotel in Alton, traces of floral perfume from a woman who took her life more than a century ago greet visitors in room 220. Spirits abound at the DeSoto House Hotel in Galena, one bearing an unsettling likeness to Abraham Lincoln. At the Congress Plaza Hotel in Chicago, children from the past still laugh after dark. From the polite spirit at the Inn at 835 Boutique Hotel in Springfield, who encourages guests to “turn the page,” to the specter of the jilted chambermaid at St. Charles’s Hotel Baker, author Maria Salvo Benson guides intrepid readers through hotels and getaways where previous guests never truly checked out.

Author Maria Salvo-Benson guides the intrepid through the most haunted hotels and getaways throughout the Prairie State.

Some Ohioans are destined for greatness--some are destined for notoriety.

Akron's Edward Wayne Edwards got an early start, snatching cash and cigarettes from his grandmother's purse. He eventually graduated to murder, offing as many as five people, and he ended up on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list along the way. Lester Eubanks killed a fourteen-year-old in Mansfield. After his death sentence was commuted to life, he was mistakenly allowed to go Christmas shopping and disappeared from a Columbus mall in 1973. U.S. Marshals are still looking for him. Cleveland bank robber "Fast Eddie" Watkins held off fifty lawmen for eight hours while sitting in his car in front of a house near Lodi. John Dillinger was born a Hoosier, but he took from Ohio banks as though he had a birthright to the funds.

From counterfeiters to killers, author Jane Ann Turzillo explores the sordid lives of some of the most awful characters in Buckeye history.

Celebrate fifty defining moments in Pennsylvania sports history.

Few states in the nation can boast as vibrant and fascinating a sports heritage as Pennsylvania. With the Immaculate Reception, Franco Harris transformed a struggling Steelers franchise into a legendary one. On the other side of the state, the Philadelphia Flyers once struck a symbolic blow during the Cold War by overwhelming CSKA Moscow. The origins of pro football possibly lie in Greensburg, and an NFL title was “stolen” in Pottsville. The greatest college football team no one’s ever heard of hails from Carlisle, and college football’s oldest rivalry still rages between Lafayette and Lehigh. The most dominant performance ever in professional basketball took place in Hershey, where the great Wilt Chamberlain poured in one hundred points in a single game.

Historians David Finoli and Tom Rooney bring these stories—and many more—to life in this thrilling ride through all things sports in the Keystone State. 

Savor the unexpected and altogether delectable history of Chinese food in the Queen City

While a smattering of chop suey houses were sprinkled around Cincinnati around the turn of the twentieth century, Wong Yie was the first to present the cuisine to non-Chinese Cincinnatians as a new, exotic, and upscale dining experience with his Gold Dragon in 1911. Despite challenges from the Chinese Exclusion Act, which exacerbated the already massive difficulties faced by Chinese immigrants, Yie’s restaurant spawned more than eighty Chinese restaurants in the city, famed spots such as the Canton, the Wah Mee, and the Fortune Kookie. Proprietors like Mike Wong of Oriental Wok and Johnny Chu of KungFood Chu’s AmerAsia keep our local Chinese food culture alive and evolving.

Author and food etymologist Dann Woellert delves into the fascinating and mouthwatering history of Chinese food in Cincinnati.