Women Behaving Badly: True Tales of Cleveland's Most Ferocious Female Killers: an Anthology

Women who murder . . . why are they so much more fascinating than their male counterparts? Just take a look at the past 150 years in Cleveland, for example. Measure almost any murder committed by a female during those fifteen decades against any homicide by a mere male and you’ll soon discover there is simply no comparison in -cunning, quality, and sheer entertainment value between the shallow, predictable murders of men and the complex, richly nuanced slayings perpetrated by women. For evidence of this tantalizing truth, dip into any of the sixteen strange-but-true tales -collected in this anthology by Cleveland’s leading historical crime writer. Here, you’ll meet ill-fated Catherine Manz, the "Bad Cinderella" who poisoned her step-sister in revenge for years of mistreatment, then for her getaway donned her victim’s most fetching outfit, a red dress with an enormous feathered hat . . . Velma West, the big-city girl who scandalized rural Lake County in the 1920s with her -"unnatural passions"—and ended her -marriage-made-in-hell with a swift hammer’s blow to the skull of her dull husband, Eddie . . . Eva Kaber, "Lakewood’s Lady Borgia," who, along with her mother and daughter, conspired to dispose of an inconvenient husband with -arsenic and knife-wielding hired killers . . . Martha Wise, Medina’s not-so-merry widow, who poisoned a dozen relatives—including her husband, mother, and brother—because she -enjoyed going to funerals . . . And a whole cast of other, equally fascinating women who behaved very, very badly. This is wickedly entertaining reading!