Wicked Women (True Crime Box Set‪)‬

Wicked Women (three book box set) 


From the New York Times bestselling author Gregg Olsen... a box set of three full-length true crime classics about women who did the unthinkable. 


Bitter Almonds 

A domestic terrorist and the greed that drove her to murder 


Stella Nickell's small-time world was one of big-time dreams. In 1986, her biggest one came true when her husband died during a seizure, making her the beneficiary of a $175,000-plus insurance payoff—until authorities discovered Bruce Nickell's headache capsules had been laced with cyanide. In an attempt to cover her tracks, Stella did the unconscionable. She saw to it that a stranger would also become a "random casualty" of cyanide-tainted painkillers. But Stella's cunning plan came undone when her daughter Cynthia notified federal agents. What would turn a gregarious barfly like Stella into a cold-hearted killer? Why would Cynthia, a mirror image of her mother, turn on her own flesh and blood? The stunning answers would unfold in a case that sparked a national uproar, dug deep into a troubled family history, and exposed an American mother for the pretty poison she was. 


Bitch on Wheels 

The true story of a murderous wife and her mountain man lover 


Sharon Nelson, a Colorado woman, had her lover Gary Adams murder two of her three husbands, five years apart. But more interesting than the crime itself is Olsen's portrait of Nelson as a brash, trashy, manipulative sexpot who believed that she was entitled to (and got) everything and everyone she wanted: even her confession, given freely to police in a Pizza Hut restaurant, was anything but contrite. Moreover, Olsen records the recollections of many community members who saw Nelson for what she was, yet seemed oblivious to the adultery, theft and murder under their noses (Publisher's Weekly). 


Cruel Deception 

The true story of a Munchausen mom and her tiny victims 


In this true story, Olsen delivers the chilling tale of a mother so desperate for attention that she murdered one of her children and repeatedly attempted to suffocate the other. This was one of the first books to focus on Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, a disorder in which parents create fake illnesses in their children to receive attention from their families and medical practitioners.