Kathryn Kelly by Barbara Casey
Cardinal Publishers Group: 2/1/16
Trade paperback; 196 pages
ISBN-13: 9781939521491
Kathryn Kelly by Barbara Casey is a recommended historical biography of the gun moll Kathryn Kelly, wife of Machine Gun Kelly.
If you have any interest in reading about the criminal activity during
the prohibition era, then this would be a good addition to your
collection. While many books feature the men involved, there were women
who were also career criminals during this time, like Kathryn Kelly, aka
Cleo Lera Mae Brooks.
Casey quickly covers the background of both Kathryn and George and
highlights their early forays into various illegal activities, with
bootlegging being high on the list. It is likely Kathryn who encouraged
George to expand his activities to include bank robberies and
kidnapping. This escalation eventually resulted in their capture, arrest, and trial.
In 1933 George "Machine Gun" Kelly and his wife Kathryn Kelly went on
trial in Oklahoma City for the kidnapping of and holding for $200,000
ransom Oklahoma businessman Charles Urschel. This was a first major case
solved by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI, now that kidnapping was a federal
crime. It was also the first time a trial was allowed to be filmed in a
federal courtroom, which made the defendants stars, of a sort, as the
nation watched.
Kathryn Kelly includes 16 pages of photographs. As is my wont, I
was pleased to see included an epilogue summarizing what happened to
others involved in the kidnapping and trial, notes of interest, a
bibliography, and index. This is a well written and researched
biography, although it is not exhaustive, it does succinctly provide
accurate historical information about Kathryn Kelly.
It is worth noting that in my copy, on page 13, last paragraph
mistakenly spells Kathryn as "Katherine." It's an easy mistake to make,
but one that should have been corrected. It is also worth mentioning
that the font size on this biography is larger than normal which is good
news if you like larger print books but a bit disconcerting for the
rest of us, as is choosing a different font style for the table of
contents. These are little quibbles, but, nonetheless, they do stand
out.
Disclosure: I received an advanced
reading copy of this book from the publisher and iRead Book Tours for review
purposes.
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1 comment:
Thank you for your review of KATHRYN KELLY: THE MOLL BEHIND MACHINE GUN KELLY. I am delighted that you found Kathryn to be as interesting as I did in writing about her.
My best to you and your bloggers.
Barbara
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