What do you think?
Rate this book
The Murder of Thora Chamberlain: A Shocking True Crime Story
November 2, 1945: On her way to a high school football game with friends, a fourteen-year-old girl vanishes after driving away with a man who says he needs a babysitter.
The FBI unleashes its top kidnapping expert, an agent who helped bring John Dillinger down. Will that be enough to find the girl and her abductor?
Agents chase the suspected kidnapper from California to Illinois and back again.
Arrested in Los Angeles, he admits abducting the child. He also tells the FBI he killed the girl and threw her body into the Pacific Ocean. A search for her corpse proves fruitless.
Then, when all hope is lost, authorities discover the skeleton of another young woman who's fallen victim to this madman.
Ready for another twist? The wife of the man who made that discovery is found dead at the bottom of the cliff.
During the accused killer's trial, women around the country fall in love with the handsome monster and literally break down the doors of a courthouse to get close to him.
Wild enough for you? Wait. After the child's killer is convicted and sentenced to the gas chamber, a scientist shows up and says he can bring the murderer back from the dead.
The Murder of Thora A Shocking True Crime This is the wildest, most shocking, true crime story you've ever read.
The FBI unleashes its top kidnapping expert, an agent who helped bring John Dillinger down. Will that be enough to find the girl and her abductor?
Agents chase the suspected kidnapper from California to Illinois and back again.
Arrested in Los Angeles, he admits abducting the child. He also tells the FBI he killed the girl and threw her body into the Pacific Ocean. A search for her corpse proves fruitless.
Then, when all hope is lost, authorities discover the skeleton of another young woman who's fallen victim to this madman.
Ready for another twist? The wife of the man who made that discovery is found dead at the bottom of the cliff.
During the accused killer's trial, women around the country fall in love with the handsome monster and literally break down the doors of a courthouse to get close to him.
Wild enough for you? Wait. After the child's killer is convicted and sentenced to the gas chamber, a scientist shows up and says he can bring the murderer back from the dead.
The Murder of Thora A Shocking True Crime This is the wildest, most shocking, true crime story you've ever read.
- GenresTrue CrimeAudiobook
240 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 19, 2021
About the author
Rod Kackley
78 books25 followersI quit my job to write. That’s how much love writing. It’s also an indication of how utterly frustrated I was with my life as a middle manager in a national corporation. Mid-life crisis? No, I don’t think so. It’s more that I saw the finish line approaching more rapidly than I expected thirty years before.
What I am is what I write.
The characters in the St. Isidore Collection, the people who live in this town I have created in my mind, all contain some thread of me. Let’s be honest. I write what I know. And I know the frustration of listening to the millennials at work talk about their plans for the next thirty years, and suddenly realizing I don’t have thirty years left.
For Henry Branson, the protagonist in the short story, Revenge is Best Served Bloody, you’ll see that thread taken to its extreme.
Adam King, a central player in Wicked Revenge: Book 2 From the St.Isidore Collection is a middle-aged guy who quit his job to follow his dream and open a bookstore.
Bree, the protagonist in A Wicked Plan: Book 1 From the St. Isidore Collection is not a middle-aged woman. She’s a teenager. But Bree already feels the frustration that people more than twice her age experience. She feels like others are holding her back and Bree is willing to do whatever it takes to get them out of her way.
There are others in St. Isidore, who only want to love and be loved. They believe the fantasy and are willing whatever they have to do to make it come true.
Beth is the perfect example of that. She is a supporting player in A Wicked Plan, but a central character in Wicked Revenge. Beth loves Bree. She wants Bree. All Beth wants is for Bree to want and adore her. Then Beth finds out Bree is cheating on her with Melinda. What do you think Beth does?
What would you do?
And then there is Tim. Destined to become St. Isidore's most celebrated criminal, all he wants is to be loved. Does he have to kill all the women who reject him?
I see myself in all of my friends in St. Isidore. Well, maybe not Tim, but most of them. Hopefully, you will too.
Welcome to the St. Isidore Collection. It's more than a series of dark, realistic and sometimes supernatural, paranormal, noir fiction.
The St. Isidore Collection is a community. Want to be our neighbor?
Rod
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
January 29, 2023
A well researched and compelling true story, although it is desperately in need of editing.
February 3, 2023
This was an interesting read, despite all the typos and misspellings. Nevertheless, they made it difficult, for me, to read the book. The author uses slang and many, many cultural references from the 1940's in order to set the mood, however; they come across as contrived. The story in itself becomes somewhat confusing as it's really two in one with clear resolution to either. Still, it is an interesting read as the writer heavily delves into the early days of Hoover's FBI and their investigative techniques.
July 3, 2022
Good read not great
I did enjoy this read the thing I found distracting was the made up conversations, I don't care for books that do that, it reads too much like fiction which I never read.
I did enjoy this read the thing I found distracting was the made up conversations, I don't care for books that do that, it reads too much like fiction which I never read.
October 8, 2022
14-year-old Thora Chamberlain and several of her friends are on the way to a football game at their school. A blue Plymouth pulls to the curb and the driver tells the girls he needs a babysitter for his little sister (sometimes he says it's for his sister's child). None of the girls indicate any interest except Thora who would like to earn some money.
Thora gets into the car and is never seen again. The story has more twists and turns than a novel and covers the intensive search for the girl, the arrest and trial of a suspect, and beyond.
NO PHOTOS
95
Thora gets into the car and is never seen again. The story has more twists and turns than a novel and covers the intensive search for the girl, the arrest and trial of a suspect, and beyond.
NO PHOTOS
95
April 19, 2023
This is the first true crime I've read from post WWII. Kackly was excellent at staying in the time period. It had a subtle feeling of Dashiell Hammett with an underlying layer of humor. I could picture Humphrey Bogart as EJ, the FBI agent. And the supposed villain, Thomas McMonigle, was a most outlandish criminal, with charm, self-importance and really no regard for laws. This all said, the author kept reverence for Thora's family. Two other mysteries intertwined, one a seeming coincidence. Research was solid. The theme: did he or didn't he, played out until the very end.
May 28, 2023
I enjoyed this book, which definitely has a much different style from most true crime I've read. It's a bare-bones telling of the story of Thora's murder. There's no "Thora's great-grandfather arrived in California in 1859 ..." or "The cliffs of San Mateo were formed hundreds of thousands of years ago when ..." If anything, it could perhaps benefit from a few of those asides. This is strictly the story as it happens. It's an easy, breezy read.
May 28, 2023
A teenager lured into a car by a killer
I read this true crime book with great interest. The murder took place in post-World War Two California and the culture of that time and setting is well-drawn. A cast of sleazy characters adds to the interest of the painstaking police investigation. I streamed this book on my Amazon HD 10 Kindle Fire tablet thru Kindle Unlimited.
I read this true crime book with great interest. The murder took place in post-World War Two California and the culture of that time and setting is well-drawn. A cast of sleazy characters adds to the interest of the painstaking police investigation. I streamed this book on my Amazon HD 10 Kindle Fire tablet thru Kindle Unlimited.
February 16, 2024
The End?
I enjoyed this book even though it was set in the1940s and the slang and references to culture during that time were pretty corny. The end was a huge disappointment. I didn't feel like I had the full story. It was like I was waiting for some kind of justice but the book just ended and I am left to use my imagination to come to a conclusion.
I enjoyed this book even though it was set in the1940s and the slang and references to culture during that time were pretty corny. The end was a huge disappointment. I didn't feel like I had the full story. It was like I was waiting for some kind of justice but the book just ended and I am left to use my imagination to come to a conclusion.
September 21, 2022
Getting to know humans can take many roads
The bad guy probably had some mental impairment. Or else we would all be just like him. What is disconcerting is that this still goes on. I guess our species is not perfect.
The bad guy probably had some mental impairment. Or else we would all be just like him. What is disconcerting is that this still goes on. I guess our species is not perfect.
September 25, 2022
This seemed well researched.
I wish this book were longer. I would have liked to have seen many more pictures.
Also to have heard more about the FBI and about Thora's life, her parents and community. Still it made a good afternoon's reading.
I wish this book were longer. I would have liked to have seen many more pictures.
Also to have heard more about the FBI and about Thora's life, her parents and community. Still it made a good afternoon's reading.
October 20, 2022
An interesting read. It's rare to read about this type of crime from so long ago. Seems degenerate men have always preyed on young women. The notion that somehow serial killers and serial
rapists are a product of modern times is just a myth.
rapists are a product of modern times is just a myth.
December 4, 2022
Good documentation of a very hard time
I liked the depth of the characters
The time lime helped you keep track of who was doing what.
The last few chapters were in a different light but so was what was happening to not only California but also the post World Two
I liked the depth of the characters
The time lime helped you keep track of who was doing what.
The last few chapters were in a different light but so was what was happening to not only California but also the post World Two
March 13, 2023
How have I never heard of this?
I found this story extremely interesting, not sure how I've never heard of it. As a true crime book fanatic that I am this was definitely worth reading in my opinion. Two thumbs up!
I found this story extremely interesting, not sure how I've never heard of it. As a true crime book fanatic that I am this was definitely worth reading in my opinion. Two thumbs up!
November 3, 2023
Just an OK read
Shocking murder but I found this book difficult to read. Short sentences, short paragraphs, very short chapters. I spead read latter half of book as I lost interest
Shocking murder but I found this book difficult to read. Short sentences, short paragraphs, very short chapters. I spead read latter half of book as I lost interest
September 8, 2022
Murder of Thora
Thought this was poorly written didn't hold my interest but stuck with it. Could have written this in 50 pages
Thought this was poorly written didn't hold my interest but stuck with it. Could have written this in 50 pages
Read
October 9, 2022Needs editing
But other than that, a very good rendition of a very old true crime classic.
Kackley is good for this kind of crime and does if well
But other than that, a very good rendition of a very old true crime classic.
Kackley is good for this kind of crime and does if well
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews