Truman Capote wants to write an epic nonfiction that is increasingly in vogue and tries to achieve a synthesis between myth and event and it is “In Cold Blood” that Truman Capote replaces pure fantasy with facts. The story is about a mass murder by two psychopaths in a small Kansas town, and its narrative helps usher in the style of the non-fiction novel. His style of mixing prose and hybrid non-fiction is widely imitated by journalists and other authors and is the forerunner of the New Journalism movement.

The book is about the murder of a wealthy farmer, his wife, and their two children in Holcomb, Kansas. When he learns of the Clutter family’s quadruple murder, he travels to Kansas with his childhood friend and fellow author, Harper Lee.

Together they interview local residents and investigators and the killers, Richard “Dick” Hickock and Perry Smith, are arrested shortly after the murders, with Capote ultimately spending six years working on the book. Capote does a lot of research for this job and once the criminals are found, tried and convicted, Capote holds personal interviews with Smith and Hickock. Smith especially fascinates the author and in his book he describes him as the more sensitive and guilt-conscious of the two murderers. Capote never takes notes during the interview, but instead writes from memory. He further compares “the appellate system” of American jurisprudence to a game of chance. In his book, the contestants go endlessly from state courts to federal courts to finally reach the Supreme Court of the United States. Capote criticizes the ways and means by which a trial narrative is produced which is later seen in Norman Mailer’s “The Executioner’s Song”.

Thus, “In Cold Blood” was published in 1966 as a “non-fiction novel”, as Capote says in his own words. It brings him fame and literary recognition and becomes an international bestseller. Although some true crime writers consider it a controversial work and a forgery, it paves the way for future journalists and true-life story writers and establishes Capote as the pioneer of today’s nonfiction novels.