Claire St. Amant - KILLER STORY: THE TRUTH BEHIND TRUE CRIME TELEVISION
Featured Book
Killer story: the truth behind true crime television
"Claire St. Amant spent nearly a decade in network television chasing the biggest true crime stories in the country. Bringing a true crime story to network television requires quick thinking and tenacious stamina, and in her debut memoir, Claire offers true crime fans a rare in-depth look on the other side of the yellow tape"--
This book will be available for purchase at the event.
About This Event
Join us for the paperback release of Texas author Claire St. Amant's book Killer Story: The Truth Behind True Crime Television on Thursday, November 12. Claire will be in conversation with local author Lise Olsen.Follow a journalist and TV producer from 48 Hours and 60 Minutes as she carves out a career in the ruthless, knives-out world of true crime television . . . one killer story at a time.Serial killers. Homicidal spouses. Sociopathic criminals. Claire St. Amant has met them all.She spent nearly a decade in network television chasing the biggest true crime stories in the country, including the murder of Chris Kyle, plastic-surgeon-turned-murder-for-hire suspect Thomas Michael Dixon, the Parkland high school mass shooting, the disappearance of Christina Morris, and serial killer Samuel Little.Bringing a true crime story to network television requires quick thinking and tenacious stamina, and in her debut memoir, Claire offers true crime fans a rare in-depth look from the other side of the yellow tape.This eye-opening look behind the scenes of true crime television offers an unforgettable read—and a window into the daily reality of investigative journalism.Pre-order the paperback here and get it nearly two weeks before the November 24 release date when you come to the event! Investigative journalist Claire St. Amant is a former CBS News producer for 48 Hours and 60 Minutes, host of the podcast Final Days on Earth, and author of Killer Story: The Truth Behind True Crime Television, which was recognized by the Texas Institute of Letters as a best first work of nonfiction. She has reported on murder-for-hire stings, cold-case kidnappings, and the attempted assassination of a Texas judge.In 2026, she created and executive produced Killer Confessions: Case Files of a Texas Ranger, for Warner Brothers Discovery/HBO Max. A returned Peace Corps Volunteer who served in Ukraine, she currently teaches writing classes at Baylor University, her alma mater.Lise Olsen is an investigative reporter and editor and the award-winning author of Code of Silence and The Scientist and the Serial Killer. Her reports have contributed to the prosecutions of a former congressman and a federal judge, inspired laws and reforms, helped solve cold cases and identify murder victims, and freed wrongfully held prisoners. Her writing has appeared in the Texas Observer, NBC News, the Houston Chronicle, Texas Monthly, and elsewhere. She is featured in Netflix’s The Texas Killing Fields, Paramount+’s The Pillowcase Murders, CNN’s The Wrong Man, and the A&E series The Eleven. She lives near Houston, Texas, where she and her husband raised two boys of their own.
About the Venue
Brazos Bookstore
Houston's oldest independent bookstore, operating since 1974. We are a general bookstore with a curated inventory in fiction, poetry, romance, horror, graphic novels, works in translation, history, media studies, local interest, and children's books. Brazos hosts or participates in over 300 events a year, in-store and with some of Houston's premiere cultural and educational organizations, such as Inprint, Performing Arts Houston, Asia Society, Rice University, and University of Houston.
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Mrinalini Levin-Srinivasan and Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan - BIRD/DOG
Brazos welcomes Mrinalini Levin-Srinivasan and Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan on Monday, October 26 to discuss their book Bird/Dog. The authors will be in conversation with DaQuon Wilson. What does home mean to you? Is it a place where you are safe? The freedom to go wherever you please? Or the people who understand you?High above, Bird roams the open sky but dreams of having a home. Down below, Dog has a family, yet longs to discover life beyond the fence. When their separate adventures lead them away from everything familiar, both must navigate uncertainty, new relationships and the surprising ways in which friendship can appear.Told through two very different perspectives, Bird/Dog is a warm and hopeful story about freedom, belonging, individuality and finding your place in the world.Copies of Bird/Dog will be available for purchase at the event. Mrinalini Levin-Srinivasan is a student at Lanier Middle School in Houston, Texas. A highly motivated young writer, Mrinalini benefited from the isolation of the pandemic years, when she found herself reading for hours daily. She is currently a Speech and Debate Team Captain, Lanier Leader, and member of the National Junior Honors Society. She has won numerous writing and speaking competitions at the University Interscholastic League and is the founder of a Banned Books Club. Mrinalini has studied bharatanatyam, Carnatic music, and the clarinet, and is a competitive swimmer with HTX Swims. She has lived in six U.S. states and two countries.Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan is an award-winning author of 15 books for children and adults, published in India and the United States, and the recipient of India’s 2022 National Film Award for Best Narration. Her acclaimed works include It’s Time to Rhyme, winner of PublishingNext’s Children’s Book of the Year 8+ (2022), and Prince with a Paintbrush: The Story of Raja Ravi Varma. She writes fiction, nonfiction, poetry and picture books, with her work appearing in international journals and anthologies. A frequent speaker at literary festivals, Shobha divides her time between California and India, drawing on her cross-cultural experiences as a proud global citizen.DaQuon Wilson is a PhD student in the English department at Rice University, where he studies African American and Black Diasporic literature with an emphasis on children’s literature and social justice. Before coming to Rice, DaQuon worked with Scholastic Book Clubs and earned a B.A. from Emory University.
The Living Read Book Club
Join us every month for a ghastly good time, open to all who seek to explore the darkest regions of fiction. Our lead buyer and hopeless horror nerd Keaton curates and conducts this newest addition to our book group offerings—THE LIVING READ! Monsters, ghosts, murderers, and more await all who descend into this literary lair of horrors. And perhaps you’ll even find the authors of these nightmarish works themselves lurking among the shadows!September's book is The Final Girl Support Group and we will be joined by author Grady Hendrix. This event will be hosted on Zoom. Click here to register. Click here to view our main Living Read Book Club page.Use Coupon Code BOOKCLUB to get the 15% book club discount!