Cape Fear Murders

Staying out of trouble isn't a challenge, except when your Italian ex-father-in-law is involved with organized crime, the man in your life is a former FBI agent, and you have a penchant for finding dead bodies.

Murder Along the Cape Fear is the story of Fayetteville and Fort Bragg, North Carolina, during the twentieth century. Seen through the eyes of a native son, this is the tale of one - a distinguished historian - who lived through some of it and heard about much of it from friends and relatives. In this hundred-year journey the town was profoundly impacted by the establishment of Fort Bragg 10 miles to its west. Throughout this hundred-year history, murder seems to be the scarlet thread that stitched the town into infamy. The book demonstrates that Fayetteville was by no means innocent prior to the coming of Fort Bragg. Nor did all of the crime and evil emanate from Fort Bragg after 1918. As for murder, there was an abundance of killing that had no connection with Fort Bragg, but the most sensational murder case of the century involved Jeffrey MacDonald, a Green Beret Army captain and physician who received three life terms in federal prison for killing his pregnant wife and two daughters. While many other Fort Bragg soldiers were involved with murders along the Cape Fear, murders were also committed by transient civilians and local citizens like the famous inventor of the M-1 carbine, Marshall "Carbine" Williams, and Velma Barfield, who poisoned her mother and three other people. In all, about two dozen murder cases-some highly publicized and some not-are woven into this story about a North Carolina town in the twentieth century. Engagingly told, this book is a wonderful blend of history, lore, and murder.

Staying out of trouble isn't a challenge, except when your Italian ex-father-in-law is involved with organized crime, the man in your life is a former FBI agent, and you have a penchant for finding dead bodies.

When high school girls are being murdered and thrown into the Cape Fear River in a small Southern town, it has all the signs that a serial killer is at work .The murders go unsolved by law enforcement as local corruption and politics come into play. The scenario changes after the daughter of an influential member of the community becomes one of the murdered vicitims. Called to the scene is a somewhat middle aged, over-the-hill private insvestigator whose appearance and demeanor look nothing like your typical "TV Private Investigator." Kenneth Sadler's looks and "Good Ole Country Boy" way of doing things fail to show an abundance of experience and knowledge. Keneth's worldly maner and high moral characer are not expressed at all. Well, maybe with the exception of the fact that he attracts widow women like a magnet. He often proves that "Older is Better!" Kenneth Sadler pursues what seems to be a hometown serial killler at full speed. In his pursuit, he finds that the case is more complex than first thought. The real mystery is what makes a person a serial killer.

Ashley stumbles over the dead body of a real-estate investor in a local bookshop.

How far would you go to save your family? In John D. MacDonald’s iconic masterwork of suspense, the inspiration for not one but two Hollywood hits, a mild-mannered family is tormented by an obsessed criminal—and with the authorities powerless to protect them, they must take the law into their own hands. Introduction by Dean Koontz Sam Bowden has it all: a successful law career, a devoted wife, and three children. But a terrifying figure from Bowden’s past looms in the shadows, waiting to shatter his pristine existence. Fourteen years ago, Bowden’s testimony put Max Cady behind bars. Ever since, the convicted rapist has been nursing a grudge into an unrelenting passion for revenge. Cady has been counting the days until he is set free, desperate to destroy the man he blames for all his troubles. Now that time has come. Praise for Cape Fear “The best of [John D. MacDonald’s stand-alone] novels . . . an acute psychological study of base instinct, terror, mistakes, and raw emotion.”—Lee Child “A powerful and frightening story.”—The New York Times “Terrific suspense.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer Originally published as The Executioners