Nightmare in Napa
The Wine Country Murders
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
An award-winning journalist delves behind the scenes of a chilling true crime story aired on TV's 48 Hours—and uncovers twisting revelations inside an already shattering case of double homicide.
Halloween night in idyllic Napa, California: two young women roommates—a transplanted Southern beauty queen and a popular engineering graduate from the Napa area—are brutally stabbed by an intruder who entered their home through a first-floor window. A third roommate heard the horrific commotion but never saw the killer. News of the tragedy sent shockwaves throughout the peaceful region as well as the nation—but while investigators pursued every angle from a satanic cult to a disgruntled suitor, the murders of Leslie Mazzara and Adriane Insogna remained unsolved. Until someone came forward with a shocking confession—someone who was close enough to the women to escape suspicion. Someone who knew the victims all too well.
Complete with up-to-the-minute court action and the stunning crime scene breakthroughs that turned the case around, here is the full story of the Nightmare in Napa.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
LaRosa, a producer of the CBS newsmagazine 48 Hours, kicks off that show's true crime paperback series with this riveting account of the horrific 2004 murder of two young women living in the peaceful wine country of Napa, Calif. On Halloween night, Lauren Meanza awakes to the screams of her housemate, Adriane Insogna. Taking cover in the backyard, Lauren watches as an intruder escapes through a window; inside she finds Adriane bleeding profusely and their other housemate, Leslie Mazzara, laying unresponsive nearby. Neither survive. Police investigation of the murders focuses on Adriane's troubled relationship with boyfriend Christian and the many paramours of former beauty queen Leslie. When a look into Leslie's past leads law enforcement to a number of dead ends, and the suspects all fail to match DNA evidence from the crime scene, the investigation stagnates; new developments, however, eventually reveal another suspect. LaRosa's clear chronology and thorough research give the tale the weight of reality, while his skillful winnowing of details and novellike prose keep the pace up and the pages turning; anyone with a taste for true crime will happily gulp down this sharp, satisfying narrative.
