Reading lists

A reading list for ‘Tiger King’ obsessives

If it's jaw-dropping true crime you want, it's jaw-dropping true crime you shall have.

Donna Mackay and Matt Blake
Tiger King
Tiger King, Netflix

If three things are certain during this period of national isolation, they are these: 1) You will gain a new appreciation of the uplifting powers of sunlight. 2) You will think more about toilet roll than you ever previously thought possible. 3) You will watch the Netflix blockbuster Tiger King.

Tiger King, if you've not yet heard about it, is the isolation-era internet's latest obsession. Words alone don't have the power to do justice to all its twists and quirks: the see-them-to-believe-them personalities, the polyamorous cat cults, vanishing husbands, tiger-sanctuary feuds, murder-for-hire plots, the incredibly libellous low-budget music videos... Joe Exotic's glorious peroxide mullet. In short, it's a true-crime documentary with an awful lot going on. And it's completely addictive.

Of course, books have been revealing true crime for years. So if Tiger King – or Serial, or Making a Murderer for that matter – has piqued your interest to begin exploring society’s most depraved transgressions, we have some great reads for you. From groundbreaking journalists to bestselling fiction writers to, in one case, the killer themselves, these titles offer a range of perspectives into some of the most notorious crimes ever to take place, exploring not just the psychology of the perpetrators but the devastation left in their wake.

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