Such research and information gathering that has gone into this book,you can only applaud the author for this however at times I thought it did repeat itself and I found myself thinking ‘I have read this before’…a truly terrifying story though,of course even more so that it is real

Well researched and detailed. I find true crime to be hit or miss and unfortunately this one was a miss for me. A bouncing timeline, characters whose names didn't stay the same throughout (Cynthia/Cindy for example), and so many family members to keep track of made it confusing. Having read some of the author's other true crime books I was disappointed that this wasn't a more interesting read for me.

ARC REVIEW
American Mother
By Gregg Olsen

Publishing date : 11/8/2022

Rating:⭐️/5

I'm going to be as gentle as I can with this review. But I HATED THIS.

The book takes a close look at a cyanide poisoning in the late 1980's. It's true crime and 100% factual so I knew what I was getting into when I requested the ARC.

I also enjoyed the previous book I read by Gregg Olsen so I was excited to give another one of his books a go!

Guys....I hated this so much. It was SO LONG and drawnout. Right off the bat we are literally drowning In characters. So many people, so much information and so many details that honestly were not needed. It was beyond repitive and didn't keep my attention at all.

I really hate to give a bad review, but this book was 100% not for me.

This is one I will not be recommending. However I do appreciate @netgalley and @threadbooks giving me the chance to review it!

I have always enjoyed reading Gregg Olsen’s books. Non-fiction and fiction. He somehow sucks you into the stories, even if you already know about them.
This one did feel a little hard to keep my attention to but I kept going. The true story is gripping and even though I knew bits and pieces- it gave me a better understanding of the cases.

This was the true story of the 1986 Cyanide murders, a copy cat it seemed of the previous Tylenol tampering murders. It is an extremely long book that with so much duplication could be reduced probably by half. At times the author had used different names for the same people which made it hard to keep track of the individuals and this was made harder as the story intertwines the two murders and the relevant characters to each part.Having said that it was interesting to see the way that the case evolved and the final courtroom case, even with the duplication and name difficulty.
To realise that even in 1986 there was still this poverty and destitution so prevalent was a surprise as one imagines that this has all been passed a long time ago.
An interesting read but I felt that it needed pulling together a bit more to reduce the bulk and keep the readers interest.

I tend to avoid reading true crime books, often finding them contrived and boring, but Gregg Olsen has never written a boring book in his long literary career, and from the opening paragraphs I realized this is a story Gregg has lived with for more than three decades. The attention to detail makes this book a remarkable record of an extraordinary crime. It is as taut as a John Grisham legal thriller but with an emotional core that is so much more relevant because the characters on these pages really lived and died. I was shocked by the images of an America riddled with poverty and familial despair: the flip side of the American Dream.

I've read a few of Gregg's books and I understand this is a reissue of one of his earlier books. I found the story really interesting (and cannot believe it is a true story!) The book has an immense amount of detail and I found it hard going sometimes. I really appreciate the way the story is told with a narrative that lends itself to fiction storytelling. I have to say it's my least favourite of Gregg's books but it doesn't put me off reading more.

This book is about 1986 murders of Bruce Nickell and Sue Snow. Both died after they took cyanide-laced pain relievers. It was actually a copycat crime and I remember when this all went down.

Gregg Olsen clearly has done a lot of research and this is a well told, detailed telling of the story of the accused, Stella Nickell. It's a sad, shocking story any way you look at it.

Being a true crime fan, I loved the detailed look back at the psychological aspects of the case and relationships of everyone involved, including the innocent people who were not a party to all of the madness but got swept up in this nonetheless.

A solid true crime book! If you're a fan, check this one out.

Many thanks to NetGalley, Bookouture and Thread Books for ARC and ALC. Receiving both allowed me to knock this one out in a day!

A very powerful and gripping story that is difficult to read in some parts but worth sticking with. This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you very much to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

I am mixed on this one. While I enjoyed the storyline, I felt like it had such extraneous facts that easily could have been chopped to make it better. This was a mystery I had never heard of and I would love to read more like this, little known true crimes.

This is no fictional story but a true crime tale involving real people, real emotions, real situations and actual deaths and arrests of individuals.

American Mother is about the cyanide killings done through product tampering of a medicine in the decade of 1980s. The book begins with the crime scene of the death of the individuals following with their background details. And then it continues with the FBI, FDA, SEIB investigations that take place to ascertain whether the deaths were through natural cause or a sinister mind was at play. The master mind behind this cruel killings - was it really the one who was blamed or was it someone who categorically shifted the blame on someone else? Nickell family gets embroiled in this epic case due to hordes of reasons and what follows are numerous interviews, jury trial, indictments, verdicts and confessions.

It has been my first experience of reading a true crime story and I have been blown out by the detailing of the author. Facts were laid out as they actually were. While at some point the details did become overwhelming with so many names and people involved; but it couldn’t be helped since this was a reality in the past. I especially got pulled in once the FBI folks started investigating in earnest and taking interviews of multiple people. The actual transcripts shown in italics was also a lovely addition. It gave so much more authenticity to the work to actually read the diary entries or letter communications etc. The book is lengthy and I feel such true crime stories have their own niche audience. Pick this up if you love solving real life cases, like getting into details and like analysing people and their psychology.

Thanks to Thread Books and Netgalley for sharing the eARC in exchange of honest review.

After taking pain killers, two unrelated people - a man and a woman - die of what later turns out to be cyanide poisoning. Gregg Olsen's 'American Mother' dives into these deaths.

It's subtitled 'The True Story of a Troubled Family, Motherhood, and the Cyanide Murders That Shook the World' and while the murders may have, the book didn't shake a thing.

Told in narrative that jumps backwards and forwards and to the side all throughout, I struggled to keep up with all the characters - especially given that the author keeps using different names for some of them.

Cynthia is sometimes Cindy is sometimes Cynthia Lea. Cora Lee was Alva Georgia but sometimes also Jo. Sometimes characters' names are used differently in sentences that follow each other. There was no need for this, in my opinion, and one mention that Cynthia Lea went by Cindy would have been more than enough to drive the point home.

I wanted less dysfunctional family and more about the actual cyanide poisoning, and as such, I found the book lacking. It becomes more of 'whodunit' despite the overwhelming evidence the reader is privy to, which I found frustrating.

'American Mother' also includes chapter after chapter of repetitive court testimony, which bogged down the story into less of an investigation and more of a blow-by-boring-blow retelling.

Having recently read Dave Cullen's 'Columbine', I couldn't help but draw parallels about how much less compelling Olsen's delivery was. Overall, I was left bored and wanting.

Perhaps those specifically interested in court proceedings of true crime or this case in particular will enjoy this one, but I did not.

I’ll be honest…I didn’t finish this one. It’s insanely long and just didn’t hold my attention. I love true crime and I loved Greg Olson’s book, If You Tell. This one was just nowhere near that level for me. The story just wasn’t engaging and I can’t even imagine what the last 75% of the book could have even talked about.

This was a fascinating and well written novel of the cyanide poisonings over 20 years ago in Washington State. I had never heard much about this story before and could not put this true crime story down. Definitely recommend it for true crime fans.

I love nonfiction that is written so well that it doesn’t feel like nonfiction: the story unfolds like a news story, is easy to follow, and while well researched, is not bogged down with facts. I didn’t know much about the cyanide murders in Washington state but was fascinated from the very beginning, about the plotting, and the relationship between Stella and her daughter, Cindy. Recommended for true crime fans,

I loved ‘If You Tell,’ and this one, ‘American Mother’ was clearly written in that same woman-pretending-she’s-not-terrible style. But while IYT had enough action and events to cover an entire read, this one didn’t. Half of the book is just literally reading the back-and-forth dialogue between lawyers and witnesses at the trial. The premise is fascinating, but I would have preferred a one-episode podcast to whole book. The writing wasn’t bad; just not enough substance for me.

Gregg Olsen is by far one of my favorite authors of true crime and fiction. The story was interesting and very well written. I can not wait for more by him!

Maybe as Im not an american i had never heard of this author or the cyanide poisoning case they outline in this book..
It piqued my interest however and, once I'd got into the style of writing, I found it a fascinating read which threw up all the moral dilemmas of reading about someone else's life being dissected and the effect on those around them. The author had obviously done a huge, bordering on obsessive, amount of research around the case and , I have to admit, this became quite overwhelming after a while and would have benefitted from a tighter edit as sadly i found it hard to maintain concentration and interest by the end
Thank you to netgalley and Thread books for an advance copy of this book.

*Thank you to Thread books, Gregg Olsen, and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest opinion

Previously published at https://www.mysteryandsuspense.com/american-mother/

“But there’s a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking. But behind all your stories is always your mother’s story, because hers is where yours begin.”

― Mitch Albom, For One More Day

American Mother is a re-release of a true crime novel called Bitter Almonds, initially released 20 years ago. It is about the 1986 murders of Bruce Nickell and Sue Snow, when they unknowingly took cyanide-laced headache pain relievers. This is Gregg Olsen at his finest, a detailed, extensively researched novel about the investigation regarding the two victims, who were strangers, and the mother and daughter duo who helped plan the murders.

Stella Nickell was tired of her husband sitting at home doing nothing at all every night. After all, their marriage was based on a love of partying and drinking. So when Bruce Nickell got sober and didn’t want to go to bars, Stella got bored. So instead of asking for a divorce, she takes a trip to the local market and purchases some Excedrin and Anacin bottles, takes some capsules out to fill with foxglove seeds and cyanide from an algae killer, and puts them back on the shelf so it would seem like an epidemic of cyanide laced capsules. When Bruce reaches for some Excedrin for a headache, he dies almost instantly after ingesting the capsules. Sue Snow, a stranger to the Nickells, purchases one of those bottles of Excedrin, as she always takes four in place of caffeine each morning, and dies before she leaves the house, discovered by her young daughter Hayley.

Living a few miles from where this story took place, it surprised me I had never heard of it. Especially, being a true crime junkie. I wondered why Olsen would re-release a book that is 20 years old but he writes in his author’s note that there have been so many updates to this case over the years, including the fact that he has located the daughter, Cindy, who was hiding for years. Whether you are familiar with this crime, the author offers a fresh take, including significant updates on some of the main characters. This account describes in detail the relationship between Stella Nickell and her daughter Cynthia, and where it went wrong. The author has done such an extensive investigation and literally left no stone unturned, including interviewing key members of this tragedy.

There are many many characters in this book. A lot of them are friends and family of the Nickells. They divide into two groups; those who believe Stella Nickell is capable of murder and those who don’t. Unfortunately for Stella, her own daughter believes she is capable and turns her into the FBI. A good portion of the book is their relationship and how it crumbles. As with If You Tell, another unbelievable true-crime novel by Olsen, this story is equally difficult to believe.

Gregg Olsen writes as if he is describing the story to an old friend. I felt like I knew these characters, and despite most of them being awful, they were relatable and I cared what happened to them. He describes their homes, clothes and landscapes in such a way as if we were there. What could have been a laborious police procedural turns into a fantastic depiction of a true crime, which happened a few towns away.

I'm not a big True Crime reader, but American Mother was fascinating and quick moving. I was immediately drawn into the story and the accounts of the deaths and families. Gregg Olsen does a wonderful job pulling all the details together to write a cohesive narrative. I was too young to be aware of the Cyanide Murders in the mid-1980s, so I went in with no knowledge. The short chapters made it easy to read quickly. I listened to the audiobook which was perfectly narrated. Definitely recommend this book if you're looking to read well-written narrative nonfiction about a notorious case.

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for providing this ARC. All thoughts are my own.