Mysterious Persons in History: Baffling Cases of Unsolved Mysteries (Books by Fred Neff)

Rating:
Summary: Treat for Detective Fans
Review: Fans of detective stories will love Mysterious Persons in History that explores controversial unsolved mysteries such as Jack the Ripper, Harry Oaks, Lizzie Borden, Napoleon and others. Each person is covered in a separate chapter where fascinating facts and questions related to this person are explored. The reader gets a chance to ponder and resolve each of these cases. It is great fun to work with the facts supplied to solve these time tested mysteries. Mysterious Persons is a terrific way to learn history and practice problem solving at the same time as enjoying true life mystery cases.

Rating:
Summary: Highly recommended
Review: I enjoyed this book very much and would highly recommend it to anyone interested in mysterious people and events. The book's style is readable, interesting and entertaining. The topics selected and the very readable format makes it a great book to encourage the "reluctant" reader. Both of my children enjoyed the book and are interested in finding out more about the people and the mysteries discussed in the book.

Rating:
Summary: Great book-really captures the imagination
Review: Take a look back in time and examine eight of the greater unsolved mysteries by reading Mysterious Persons in History by Fred Neff. There are stories on Lizzie Borden, Jack the Ripper, Sir Harry Oaks, Napoleon Bonaparte, Dr. Sam Shepard, William Taylor, The Black Dahlia and John Dillenger. Each of these stories is simply put a gem. This book really captures the readers attention with its well written and interesting approach to not only learning the facts that are involved in each mystery, but the questions that remain unanswered. The reader really gets involved in each of the eight mysteries just as though he was a detective solving the mystery. The book is wonderful!

Rating:
Summary: A good intro to true crime and critical thinking
Review: This book on famous unsolved murder cases (which is primarily for a junior high school/high school-aged audience) was written by an accomplished attorney, educator and Presidential Merit Award winner. This 107-page volume is very good for a number of reasons: i) it teaches issue-spotting, critical thinking and analytical writing by example, ii) it deals with complex issues in language a teenager can follow, iii) it deals with sometimes sordid topics in tasteful, nonsalacious language and iv) it contains a detailed bibliography and will likely excite some curiousity in its readers for further study.