Although Tailspin is being pushed as the final solution to the Sam Sheppard case (and it is a believable one) I enjoyed it more as a character study of Major James Call, its existential anti-hero, a man without nerves, equally at home in country club or wilderness camp, a war hero who turned to crime to fuel his adrenaline habit. But Conners also shows the price of Call’s egotism, both to himself and society. Well written, with a central character no fiction writer could come up with, Tailspin is the True Crime book of the year.