Is there an audiobook of In Cold Blood (Vintage International)?

Yes. In Cold Blood (Vintage International) has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Scott Brick.

How long is the In Cold Blood (Vintage International) audiobook?

The In Cold Blood (Vintage International) audiobook runs 14 hr 27 min.

Is In Cold Blood (Vintage International) on Kindle Unlimited?

No. In Cold Blood (Vintage International) was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on July 1, 2026.

In Cold Blood (Vintage International) by Truman Capote book cover for the Book of the Day true crime book review

Our score

4.5/ 5

Outstanding

Listen to In Cold Blood (Vintage International) free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

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EDITION PUBLISHEDOctober 2001

Genres

Non-Fiction True Crime Crime

Themes

The randomness of violenceUnderstanding versus excusingJustice and the death penaltyInnocence and its loss

In Cold Blood (Vintage International)

Name: In Cold Blood (Vintage International)
Price: 7.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: Truman Capote

Truman Capote

Capote reconstructs the 1959 slaughter of a Kansas farm family and the two drifters who did it, in prose so controlled it changed nonfiction forever. The book that invented the true-crime narrative.

The Review

Our take

In November 1959 four members of the Clutter family were murdered in their farmhouse in Holcomb, Kansas, for almost no money and no clear reason. Truman Capote read a short newspaper item, traveled to the town with Harper Lee, and spent the next six years reconstructing everything: the family's last ordinary day, the investigation, the capture and trial of the two killers, and the long wait on death row. The result, In Cold Blood, reads with the momentum of a novel and the authority of reportage, and it more or less created the modern true-crime book. Decades of the genre descend from this one, and few of them approach its craft.

What sets the book apart is its refusal of easy moralizing. Capote gives us the Clutters as fully as he gives us their killers, and his portrait of Perry Smith in particular, damaged, self-pitying, oddly tender, capable of monstrous violence, is among the most unsettling character studies in American letters. The book does not excuse the crime; it does something harder, which is to make you understand how it could happen without ever letting you forget what was lost. Capote builds dread through structure, cutting between the doomed family going about their evening and the two men driving toward them, so that the reader carries a horror the people on the page do not yet feel.

The prose is the book's quiet engine. Capote writes plainly and exactly, trusting the facts to carry their own weight, and the restraint is what makes the violence land so hard. He renders the Kansas landscape, the wheat and the wind and the small-town rhythms, with a lyricism that makes the intrusion of murder feel like a wound in the world itself. The investigation unfolds with procedural patience, and the courtroom and death-row sections raise, without sermonizing, hard questions about capital punishment, mental illness, and whether justice and understanding can ever fully coincide.

Why you should read

Readers who want the foundational modern true-crime book
Fans of literary nonfiction and reportage
Anyone drawn to deep, unsettling character study
Those interested in capital punishment and criminal psychology
Readers who like dread built through structure, not gore

What to expect

A novelistic account of a real 1959 mass murder
Intercut perspectives that build mounting dread
Restrained, exact, often lyrical prose
A haunting psychological portrait of the killers
Hard questions about justice and the death penalty

Readers should know that the book's claim to total accuracy has been challenged in the years since, and Capote's closeness to his subjects, especially Smith, complicates its objectivity. It is best read as a profoundly literary act of reconstruction rather than a courtroom transcript. But on its own terms it is close to flawless: humane, terrifying, beautifully made, and impossible to put down once the killers are on the road. More than half a century later it remains the standard against which every true-crime narrative is measured, and almost none of them measure up. The book's influence is so total that its innovations now read as the conventions of an entire genre, which is the surest sign of how original they were. Read it not only for the case but for the demonstration of what nonfiction can do when a serious artist turns the full weight of his craft on real and terrible events.

Reviewed by Quinn · How our reviews are written

Our verdict

4.5/ 5

Outstanding

Listen to In Cold Blood (Vintage International) free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

Where to read or listen

Is there an audiobook of In Cold Blood (Vintage International)?: Yes. In Cold Blood (Vintage International) has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Scott Brick.
Listen to In Cold Blood (Vintage International) free with an Audible trial
We earn from qualifying Amazon purchases.
How long is the In Cold Blood (Vintage International) audiobook?: The In Cold Blood (Vintage International) audiobook runs 14 hr 27 min.
Is In Cold Blood (Vintage International) on Kindle Unlimited?: No. In Cold Blood (Vintage International) was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on July 1, 2026.
How much does In Cold Blood (Vintage International) cost?: On Amazon: Kindle $7.99, Paperback $17.26, Hardcover $15.69. Prices as of August 25, 2026 at 3:45 AM EDT and may change.

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Common questions

What is In Cold Blood (Vintage International) about?: In November 1959 four members of the Clutter family were murdered in their farmhouse in Holcomb, Kansas, for almost no money and no clear reason. Truman Capote read a short newspaper item, traveled to the town with Harper Lee, and spent the next six years reconstructing everything: the family's…
Is In Cold Blood (Vintage International) worth reading?: We scored In Cold Blood (Vintage International) 4.5 out of 5. Capote reconstructs the 1959 slaughter of a Kansas farm family and the two drifters who did it, in prose so controlled it changed nonfiction forever. The book that invented the true-crime narrative.