Don't pick up In Cold Blood if you think it's a detective story. There is no suspense, no mystery; we know who's dead and the fates of practically everyone involved right from the get go. In Cold Blood is something far more satisfying - a character study. The genius of Capote is revealed in the fact that in describing, in meticulous detail I might add, events of a rather gruesome nature, there are but glimpses of his own opinion seeping through. He was seemingly able to remain unbiased throughout the length of writing this masterpiece and that is something any writer/journalist or really any one who picks up a pen can learn from. 
 Pick this book up if you want to see how literature was ought to be written and to gain a minuscule of insight into how the human mind works.