In 1929, Chicago gangster Al Capone arranged a special St. Valentine's Day delivery for his favorite arch enemies: a massacre. Seven North Side mobsters were left dead. Yet random killings and bizarre murders were not unfamiliar in Chicago. Tales of the city's most violent and puzzling murders make this gripping work truly hair-raising: a deranged stalker kills his love object and then himself; a sausage maker uses the tools of his trade to rid himself of his wife; and a meticulous serial killer cleans his dead victims' wounds before taping them closed. Through accounts dripping with mystery, gory details and suspense, Troy Taylor brilliantly tells the twisted history of the worst of Chicago's North Side.

Blazing from the West Side, the Great Chicago Fire left nothing but ashy remnants of the developing city leveling its landscape but certainly not its spirit. While the West Side was home to the infamous O'Leary Barn, it was also where the news of some of the city's most gruesome and horrific crime reverberated throughout the state and across the country. Read about the bloody end of Robert 'the Terrible' Toughy, who undoubtedly lived up to his name, met an ill-deserved fate. Troy Taylor also delves into the life of John Wayne Gacy the depraved man masked by the clown costume and yet again proves to be a master storyteller and historian of Chicago's criminal underworld.

New Orleans--the Big Easy, the birthplace of jazz, home of Cafe du Monde and what some call the most haunted city in America. Beneath the indulgence and revelry of the Crescent City lies a long history of the dark and mysterious. From the famous "Queen of Voodoo," Marie Laveau, who is said to haunt the site of her grave, to the wicked LaLauries, whose true natures were hidden behind elegance and the trappings of high society, New Orleans is filled with spirits of all kinds. Some of the ghosts in these stories have sordid and scandalous histories, while others are friendly specters who simply can't leave their beloved city behind. Join supernatural historian Troy Taylor as he takes readers beyond the French Quarter and shows a side of New Orleans never seen.

"Since as early as the 1700s, New Orleans has been a city filled with sin and vice. Those first pioneering citizens of the Big Easy were thieves, vagabonds and criminals of all kinds. By the time Louisiana fell under American control, New Orleans had become a city of debauchery and corruption camouflaged by decadence. It was also considered one of the country's most dangerious cities, with a reputation of crime and loose morals. Rampant gambling and prostitution were the norm in nineteenth-century New Orleans, and over one-third of today's French Quarter was considered a hotbed of sin. Tales in this volume of streets of the Crescent City in the early 1900s and Kate Townsend, a prositute who was murdered by her own lover, a man who later wass awarde her inheritance. Troy Taylor takes a look back at New Orleans's early wicked days and historic crimes" --Back cover.

Hauntings lurk and spirits linger in the Show Me State Reader, beware! Turn these pages and enter the world of the paranormal, where ghosts and ghouls alike creep just out of sight. Author Troy Taylor shines a light in the dark corners of Missouri and scares those spirits out of hiding in this thrilling collection. From a headless ghost who stalks the aptly named "Murder Rocks", to a large hairy monster that roams the banks of the Missouri River, there's no shortage of bone-chilling tales to keep you up at night. It's even rumored that the devil himself came to St. Louis in 1949, but nobody knows for sure if he ever left. Around the campfire or tucked away on a dark and stormy night, this big book of ghost stories is a hauntingly good read.

On Halloween 1926, the Curtain Closed for the Final Time of the One of the Greatest Magicians in History... Or Did it? Harry Houdini was a man obsessed with death... In his spectacular shows, he committed feats of daring that cheated death time and time again. He desperately searched for a way to contact his dead mother and some believe that Houdini actually reached out from beyond the grave to make contact from the other side - cheating death once again In this long-awaited book from Houdini and Spiritualism buff Troy Taylor, he examines the life, death and mysterious afterlife of the famed illusionist and escape artist. Not merely a biography of Houdini, this is a revealing look at Houdini's fascination with the spirit world, starting with his own days as a fraudulent medium with a traveling circus and continuing on to his exposures of fake Spiritualists, his psychical investigations, his "death pact" with fellow magicians and the legendary Houdini Sances, which are still being held today. This is a unique book in the long list of Houdini books that have been written and a worthy addition to the library of anyone with an interest in Houdini, magic or the spirit world

Join author Troy Taylor for his darkest and strangest book yet as he takes a historic, haunted and horrific look at sex and the occult through the ages, from sex magic to Satanism, demonic possession, vampires, demon rapists, poltergeists, phantom lovers & more Sex, death and the supernatural have always played important roles in human society and culture, dating back to the fertility rites of ancient Greece and the role of a virgin at a black mass. In this startling and provocative book, Troy Taylor explores the all-pervasive influence of sex on the occult, from ritual orgies to Aleister Crowley, devil worship, outbreaks of sexual possession, demon lovers, real-life vampires, the sexual side of Spiritualism, love and sex from beyond the grave, and much more As the most complete book of its kind, it draws a vivid, frightening picture of the erotic, cruel, sometimes horrifying, and always compelling beliefs and practices that have long linked the sexual and supernatural sides of our lives.