“It was the cold and calculated slaying of so many ounces of silver against so many ounces of blood” 

Murikami gave me remorseless cat murder, Capote gave remorseless dog murder. ‘In Cold Blood’s focus however was the lives of Perry and Dick, the murderers of the Clutter family, following their brutal raid and shotgun murder of the family during a November night in Kansas, 1959, narrating the actions of the killers following their deed and trial and eventual execution. Capote played with the readers sympathies to an extreme degree in his narrative, the murder so heartless and yet framing Perry to seem so led on by his remorseless partner in crime and regretful of his actions. Then you remember that this is a true crime, this happened and these two men hung and you find their actions sick and harrowing, Dick especially you loathe with your whole being Capote does him no favours, but somehow Capote keeps toying with your sympathises. 

With this being true crime yet written in a novelised format of the thriller the plot twists and draws were interesting. The murderers were established from early on, it was never a question of who was the killer, but instead the desire to learn the motive. Admittedly this motive was a bit disappointing when it came to it after so much build up, but its true crime hence this is only providing the true motive. Some bits of background and interviews I found dragged a little as Capote attempted to flesh out the narrative though also at points despite its genre was so beautiful and poetic in its writing, and particular descriptions are simultaneously incredible and harrowing: I note the scarecrow with the dead woman’s dress, the counting of coyote corpses and Perry’s nightmares about the gallows. I also particularly loved how Capote traced the ripple effect of the crime and its impacts on the thoughts and actions of those close to the victims and the inhabitants of their village.