Guilty Creatures: Sex, God, and Murder in Tallahassee, Florida

Psychologist Brottman (Couple Found Slain) meticulously catalogs the illicit passions roiling beneath a husband’s murder in this enthralling true crime narrative. The Winchesters (Brian and Kathy) and Williamses (Mike and Denise) were tight-knit friends who met at North Florida Christian High School and remained close through college, marriage, and parenthood. In 2000, Mike went missing while duck-hunting in an alligator-infested lake. Rumors flew when Denise collected $1 million in life insurance, but without a body, little could be proven. A few years later, Brian divorced Kathy and married Denise, raising eyebrows among the couple’s social circles. When Brian’s sex addiction and drug use spiraled out of control, Denise filed for divorce in 2015, and Brian snapped, kidnapping her at gunpoint. After he was arrested, authorities cut him a plea deal, and he eventually testified that he and Denise, who had long been lovers, killed Mike and collected his insurance money. Though the case itself doesn’t harbor many surprises, Brottman excels at evoking Denise and Brian’s Southern Christian milieu, and she paces the proceedings with aplomb. Readers won’t be able to look away. Agent: Betsy Lerner, Dunow, Carlson, and Lerner Literary. (July)