From the most accomplished prison journalist in America, a journalistic examination of crime, punishment, and redemption that goes beyond the headlines, from behind the wall
Reporting from the cell block and the prison yard, prison writer John J. Lennon accesses a side of true crime that outsiders rarely get to see. His first-person journalistic account tells the stories of four men who have killed: Robert Chambers, who gained media infamy in the 1980s as “The Preppy Killer;” Milton E. Jones, who at seventeen years old was coaxed from burglary into something far darker; Michael Shane Hale, a gay man who faced the death penalty after a crime of passion; and Lennon himself, who murdered a rival drug dealer in his early twenties and discovered his calling in a writing workshop at Attica.
From being misled into appearing on Chris Cuomo’s show Inside Evil, to watching his prison peers become the subjects, often unwittingly, of documentaries and podcasts, Lennon has personally experienced how true crime capitalizes on tragedy for entertainment. His vivid, intimate accounts of life on the inside cut through the sensationalism, and reveal the humanity beyond the headlines. As he and his subjects search for meaning and redemption, the same desire echoes throughout the lives of these four men: to become more than murderers.
A stunning feat of personal journalism conceived in an environment hostile to writers, THE TRAGEDY OF TRUE CRIME poses fundamental questions about the stories we tell about crime and punishment—and who gets to tell them. What essential truth is lost when we don’t consider all that comes before an act of unthinkable violence? And what happens after the cell gate locks?
A LITERARY HUB MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2025
A GOODREADS MOST ANTICIPATED FALL BOOK
“A fascinating blend of journalism and memoir… [Lennon] poses provocative questions about the flattening effects of true crime-as-entertainment and makes forceful arguments for empathy. It’s both a sobering glimpse of life behind bars and a stinging rebuttal to the public’s appetite for tragedy.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A haunting and innovative blend of memoir and true crime . . . Offers a rich and nuanced look at a population that’s often made invisible and is sure to become a classic of the genre.”
—Booklist
“Incarcerated journalist John J. Lennon is one of our most incisive writers on crime, incarceration, and the human lives behind statistics… His first book tells the stories, in full color, of four men who have killed, and in doing so, naturally ‘challenges our obsession with true crime.’”
—Lithub’s Most Anticipated Books of 2025
“For [those] of us who are ready to think seriously about ending the violence of prison without resorting to partial truths or easy clichés about what drives humans to commit harm, Lennon’s book is an essential text.”
—Jewish Currents
“Compelling and audacious… If the written word can be a mirror, John J. Lennon has made it happen.”
—David Rothenberg, host of WBAI’s Any Saturday
“At once a true crime page turner and a powerful memoir, The Tragedy of True Crime reminds us all that to be flawed is still to be human.”
—Heather Ann Thompson, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Blood in the Water: the Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy
“In terms of serious nonfiction writing, this book feels miraculous. Lennon, a journalist behind bars, examines his struggles not only with craft but also with guilt, shame, decades of imprisonment, and the yearning all humans share for reinvention. It’s a wrenchingly honest portrait of the artist as an incarcerated man.”
—Ben Austen, award-winning author of Correction: Parole, Prison, and the Possibility of Change
“In this remarkable book, John J. Lennon knits together intimate, richly reported stories of four imprisoned killers—one of them Lennon himself. He renders his subjects human without excusing or sensationalizing their crimes. But his real subject is us, the audience, the millions of viewers who have made the ‘true crime’ genre an entertainment that strips crime of its context and consequences. This is first-rate journalism, practiced up close in a high-risk environment.”
—Bill Keller, former executive editor of The New York Times and founding editor of The Marshall Project
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