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Table of Contents
About The Book
From the critically acclaimed author dubbed “one of today’s finest practitioners of nonfiction” (The New York Times Book Review), a breathless true crime tale of sex, religion, and murder in the deep South.
Mike and Denise Williams had a tight knit, seemingly unbreakable bond with childhood friends, Brian and Kathy Winchester. The two couples were devout, hardworking Baptists who lived perfect, quintessentially Southern lives. Their friendship seemed ironclad. That is, until December 16, 2000, when Denise’s husband Mike disappeared while duck hunting on Lake Seminole.
After no body was found, everyone assumed that Mike had drowned in a tragic accident, his body eaten by alligators. But things took an unexpected turn when, within five years of Mike’s disappearance, Brian Winchester divorced his wife and married Denise. Their surprising romance set tongues talking. People began wondering how long they had been a couple, and whether they had anything to do with Mike’s death. It took another twelve years for the truth to come out—and when it did, it was unimaginable.
Now, the full, shocking story is revealed by Mikita Brottman, acclaimed true crime writer of the “enthralling” (San Francisco Book Review) An Unexplained Death. Through tenacious research and clear-eyed prose, she probes the psychology of a couple who killed and explores how it feels to live for eighteen years with murder on the soul.
A fascinating page-turner of modern noir, Guilty Creatures is destined to become an instant true crime classic.
Mike and Denise Williams had a tight knit, seemingly unbreakable bond with childhood friends, Brian and Kathy Winchester. The two couples were devout, hardworking Baptists who lived perfect, quintessentially Southern lives. Their friendship seemed ironclad. That is, until December 16, 2000, when Denise’s husband Mike disappeared while duck hunting on Lake Seminole.
After no body was found, everyone assumed that Mike had drowned in a tragic accident, his body eaten by alligators. But things took an unexpected turn when, within five years of Mike’s disappearance, Brian Winchester divorced his wife and married Denise. Their surprising romance set tongues talking. People began wondering how long they had been a couple, and whether they had anything to do with Mike’s death. It took another twelve years for the truth to come out—and when it did, it was unimaginable.
Now, the full, shocking story is revealed by Mikita Brottman, acclaimed true crime writer of the “enthralling” (San Francisco Book Review) An Unexplained Death. Through tenacious research and clear-eyed prose, she probes the psychology of a couple who killed and explores how it feels to live for eighteen years with murder on the soul.
A fascinating page-turner of modern noir, Guilty Creatures is destined to become an instant true crime classic.
About The Author
Photograph by Dereck Stafford Mangus
Mikita Brottman is a writer and psychoanalyst living in Baltimore, Maryland. Her most recent book, An Unexplained Death, was shortlisted for the Gold Dagger Award for nonfiction by the Crime Writers Association of the UK. She has a DPhil from Oxford University and is a professor of literature at the Maryland Institute College of Art.
Product Details
- Publisher: Atria/One Signal Publishers (July 23, 2024)
- Length: 288 pages
- ISBN13: 9781668020555
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Raves and Reviews
“This story has it all—adultery, obsession, murder, revenge, betrayal—but Brottman doesn’t settle for the superficial. Rather than a whodunit, Guilty Creatures is a compelling psychological double portrait of what happens when two people are forever bound by a life-altering secret.”
—Becky Cooper, bestselling author of We Keep the Dead Close
“So much more than another true crime story, Mikita Brottman’s Guilty Creatures is a psychological thriller as intricately organized as a Hitchcock movie. And, with its high literary values, it stands with classics of the genre like Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song and Capote’s In Cold Blood.”
—Madison Smartt Bell, author of All Souls' Rising
“An excavation of the luridness and venality underneath a smiling, all-American façade.”
—Kirkus
“Guilty Creatures could have slinked out of fiction by Flannery O’Connor or Donna Tartt—not to mention James M. Cain—and they come alive in this richly atmospheric, deeply researched, and terrifying true crime book.”
—Betsy Bonner, author of Round Lake and The Book of Atlantis Black
“Propulsive, harrowing, and ironic, Mikita Brottman’s impeccably researched story investigates how, under pressure, morals can twist to justify even the worst actions.”
—Erika Krouse, author of Tell Me Everything: The Story of a Private Investigation
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High Resolution Images
- Book Cover Image (jpg): Guilty Creatures eBook 9781668020555
- Author Photo (jpg): Mikita Brottman Photograph by Dereck Stafford Mangus(0.1 MB)
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