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The Monster of Florence by Douglas Preston with Mario Spezi

The Monster of Florence is the moniker given to a famous serial killer in Florence, Italy who remains free to this day. In 2000, Douglas Preston moved his family to Florence so he could get background for a thriller he wanted to write. When he discovered that one of the murders occurred in the olive grove near his 14th-century farmhouse, he was intrigued. He met Italian journalist Mario Spezi, who has been investigating the case, and they teamed up to find out as much as they could. They even interviewed the man they believed responsible for the murders. For their efforts, Preston was thrown out of the country without being able to return and Spezi was jailed for a while under suspicion that he was the serial killer. The Monster of Florence has received positive reviews with BookPage saying, "The Monster of Florence reads like fast-paced fiction, no surprise really, since Preston is a first-rate novelist (The Codex, Blasphemy), and Spezi is a well-respected journalist. That the story is true lends an edge to it that is rarely achieved in fiction."