• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Home
  • About the author and her website
  • References
  • Archives
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Contact Page

Defrosting Cold Cases

Research website by Alice de Sturler

  • My Research Method
  • How to search for cases
  • Cold Case Database
  • Case of the Month: What we lost
  • Book Reviews
You are here: Home / Book Reviews / Small Towns by Mitzi Szereto

Small Towns by Mitzi Szereto

September 22, 2020 By Alice

The Best New True Crime Stories Small Towns Mitzi Szereto‘Small Towns” is the next book in the series ‘The Best New True Crime Stories‘ which is of course, the anthology series edited by Mitzi Szereto. You have seen a review of the first book ‘Serial Killers’ here as well.

Serial Killers was quite an opening act for a series and that raises the bar for the next anthology significantly. Well, without question I can say that Mitzi did not just meet that bar. She raised it.

‘Small Towns’ is at this point my personal favorite.

The book contains short stories by the following authors: Tom Larsen, C.L. Raven, Edward Butts, Mark Fryers, Alexandra Burt, Charlotte Platt, Christian Cipollini, Iris Leona Marie Cross, David Brasfield, Deirdre Pirro, Paul Williams, Joe Turner, Stephen Wade, and of course, Mitzi Szereto.

Each story explores a small town in an idyllic setting. As the cover illustration by Debra Millet shows, idyllic is an illusion as it is out of focus.

At first glance, we see a setting of a row of buildings that can come straight out of ‘Little House of the Prairie.’ Peaceful, handmade, and local craftsmen and women in a self-sustaining community. But when you zoom in the cover image becomes less sharp, even unhinged in the background. Straight lines deform and blur. The lines between buildings are no longer indicating boundaries.

It now turns into Cabot Cove that features in ‘Murder, She Wrote.’ In the episode ‘Mirror, Mirror on the Wall’ from May 1989, we see Doc Seth Hazlitt in need of a pie dish to bake dessert. When he finds nobody at home he automatically and without hesitation goes around the back, enters his friend’s Jessica Fletcher’s home through the open back door, and walks straight to the kitchen cabinets to grab a pie dish. He feels so at home and safe that without hesitation he grabs an apple from her fruit bowl but then promptly falls down on the floor, unconscious. Poisoned.

You need not be a fan of Jessica’s investigating skills to see how the calm setting of Cabot Cove stands in stark contrast to the many crimes that happen there. Lines blur there all the time and as the saying goes ‘old families have old secrets.’

Mitzi’s book takes you around the world. Some of the crimes described were solved but many were not. Many people are good at keeping secrets. And in some cases, the discussed crimes leave you unsettled for many reasons.

A small sample: we start in Snowtown, South Australia, population around 500. When the story unfolds we are left standing with 12 dead bodies, 6 plastic barrels, 4 suspects, and 1 baffled small town wondering what to do with their notoriety. In Woodstock, Ontario we see an exhumation that hopefully will answer the question whether there is a killing bride amongst the population. Mitzi’s own story gives us a painful overview of what happens when a mentally unstable young man breaks down in Alger, Skagit County, Washington.

The story by Fryers is a painful reminder of the terror the Golden State Killer unleashed on California’s population. There are eerie similarities in binding, eating from the victims’ homes, and watching tv before assaulting again.

The story by Cross is heartbreaking. Children who have been inside their home with the decaying bodies of their murdered parents before help arrived. Taking care of each other as best as they could and now facing a life of therapy to regain a sense of normalcy. This one is an unsolved case.

We haven’t touched yet on voodoo, illegal medical practices, and cannibalism.

Szereto saved the last story for one that so slowly crawls under your skin until you can hear the waves, you can smell the decaying bodies of prisoners, and can feel how a spree killer placed a small town in a permanent state of pain. They have erased his name from as many things as they could but his actions have forever shattered this small Tasmanian town.

Throughout the book, the victims and their families are treated with respect and dignity. Szereto has made sure that the book is a tribute to resilience as well as to the will of the people in small towns to move on after tragedy.

In the beginning you may think about making this your next world trip, dark tourism. Following the stories, jumping counties, countries, and continents. But after Wade’s story, I feel the need for just the blurring lines from Millet’s cover image. The knowing sharp lines turned to smudges and oddly, out of focus, knowing less, now feels comforting.

Highly recommended reading.

Note: I received a copy of the book ‘The best New True Crime Stories Small Towns’ from Mango Publishing in exchange for an honest review. My other book reviews are here.

Thank you for sharing!

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • More
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Skype (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Telegram (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Book Reviews Tagged With: Book Reviews, Mitzi Szereto

Primary Sidebar

Dina Fort

Author Notes

On this website, I write about old, unsolved cases. Most are from the pre-DNA era and are in need of renewed media attention. I only do research and leave the active investigation of these cases to the professionals.

My posts are about homicides, missing and unidentified people, wrongful convictions, and forensics as related to these cases.

On book reviews: I only review select works of true crime, crime fiction, and historical fiction/mysteries. The stories have to fit my website's theme and research. It remains my prerogative to not review a book.

My database has over 300 cases listed by the victim’s last name. You will find a brief description there as well. The database will always be free to the public to use. You cannot buy ad space on my website, ever.

All writing suggestions that come in by email are added to my to-do list in the order in which they were received. Please be patient. My to-do list is very long but no case gets dropped and I will get back in touch.

Defrosting Cold Cases is NOT an organization. It is my brainchild.

If you have any questions about my website please check the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page, the about page, and the tabs in both menu bars. If you still cannot find the answer there, please contact me.

Thank you,

Alice de Sturler

Copyright

If you use my work, please add a link back. Let your readers know where you found your information. I do the same for you. Thank you!

Protected by Copyscape

Categories

Top Posts & Pages

  • Cold Case Database
  • Gina Renee Hall partial remains found
  • How to search for cases
  • The 1980 Tim Hack and Kelly Drew murders
  • The cold case of Theresa M. Corley

Subscribe to DCC by email

Enter your email address to get new posts notifications in your inbox

RSS Defrosting Cold Cases

  • What we lost
  • The Ethics of Forensic Genealogy part 2
  • Once Two Sister by Sarah Warburton
  • Toronto John Doe 1989
  • Paul Bernard Quinters (1967 – 1993)

William Thomas Zeigler

Category: ALL POSTS

On March 31, 2016, an evidentiary hearing was held to request touch DNA testing. On July 18, 2016, Judge Whitehead denied that request.

On November 23, 2016, an appeal was filed with the Florida Supreme Court. On April 21, 2017, the Florida Supreme Court denied the request for touch DNA analysis.

On May 8, 2017 a motion for a rehearing with the US Supreme Court was filed. It was denied November 13, 2017.

In the summer of 2019, the appeal for DNA testing to the Florida Conviction Integrity Unit was denied.

Richard Lapointe

Category: ALL POSTS

In March 2015, the Connecticut State Supreme Court ordered a new trial for Richard lapointe. On Oct 2, 2015, International Wrongful Conviction Day, Richard was set free. The judge ruled that he cannot be retried for the 1987 rape-murder of Mrs. Bernice Martin. Richard Lapointe died on Aug 4, 2020 of Covid19 complications.

In 1987, someone killed Bernice Martin. I hope that she will not become a forgotten file.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Copyright: Please add a link back if you use my work. Let your readers know where you found your information. I do the same for you. If you need help with this, just contact me. Thank you, Alice de Sturler

[footer_backtotop]

Copyright © 2009–2021 - Defrosting Cold Cases - All rights reserved · Hosting & WordPress: 3J WordPress Write Data

wordpress counter

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.