Further Reading: CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties

For readers wanting to dive into topics covered in the fascinating CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties by Tom O'Neill with Dan Piepenbring, here is a compendium of books used as sources as part of this 20-year investigative effort. It makes for a great reading list for those interested in the 1960s, FBI, CIA, the counter-culture and the history of the United States of the past century. Choose a topic (organized here by the CHAOS's chapters and each book's first appearance therein) and dive in further down the rabbit hole.

CHAPTER 1: The Crime of the Century

Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders by Vincent Bugliosi with Curt Gentry, 1974
Will You Die For Me? The Man Who Killed For Charles Manson Tells His Own Story by Tex Watson as told to Chaplain Ray, 1978
My Life with Charles Manson by Paul Watkins with Guillermo Soledad, 1979



CHAPTER 2: An Aura of Danger

Heroes And Villains: The True Story Of The Beach Boys by Steven Gaines, 1995
Waiting for the Sun: A Rock & Roll History of Los Angeles by Barney Hoskyns, 1996
The Family by Ed Sanders, 2002
Dream a Little Dream of Me: The Life of Cass Elliot by Eddi Fiegel, 2005
A Different Battle: Stories of Asian Pacific American Veterans by Carina A. Del Rosario, 2000
Since Then: How I Survived Everything and Lived to Tell About it by David Crosby and Carl Gottlieb, 2006
What's It All About? by Michael Caine, 1992
Captive City by Ovid DeMaris, 1969
Roemer: Man Against the Mob: The Inside Story About How the FBI Cracked the Chicago Mob by the Agent Who Led the Attack by William F. Roemer, Jr., 1989
Deep Politics and the Death of JFK by Peter Dale Scott, 1993
Mission with LeMay: My Story by Curtis LeMay with MacKinlay Kantor, 1965
LeMay: A Biography (Great Generals) by Warren Kozak, 2009
In a Time of Torment: 1961-1967 (Nonconformist History of Our Times) by I.F. Stone, 1989
Restless Souls: The Sharon Tate Family's Account of Stardom, the Manson Murders, and a Crusade for Justice by Alisa Statman and Brie Tate, 2012



CHAPTER 3: The Golden Penetrators

The Dark Stuff: Selected Writings on Rock Music by Nick Kent, 2002
The Beach Boys and the California Myth by David Leaf, 1978
Doris Day: Her Own Story by A. E. Hotchner, 1976
The Onion Field by Joseph Wambaugh, 1973
Justice Overruled: Unmasking the Criminal Justice System by Burton Katz, 1997



CHAPTER 4: The Holes in Helter Skelter

Dutch Shea, Jr. by John Gregory Dunne, 1982
Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson by Jeff Guinn, 2013



CHAPTER 5: Amnesia at the L.A. County Sheriff's Office

My Dark Places by James Ellroy, 1996
Confessions of a Raving, Unconfined Nut: Misadventures in Counter-Culture by Paul Krassner, 1993



CHAPTER 6: Who Was Reeve Whitson?

Skorzeny, Hitler's commando by Glenn B. Infield, 1981
American Swastika: The Shocking Story of Nazi Collaborators in Our Midst from 1933 to the Present Day by Charles Higham, 1985
The Beast Reawakens: Fascism's Resurgence from Hitler's Spymasters to Today's Neo-Nazi Groups and Right-Wing Extremists by Martin A. Lee, 1997



CHAPTER 7: Neutralizing the Left

Subversives: The FBI's War on Student Radicals, and Reagan's Rise to Power by Seth Rosenfeld, 2012
The President's Commission on CIA Activities Within the United States, Rockefeller Commission, 1975
The United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, Church Committee, 1976
The COINTELPRO Papers: Documents from the FBI's Secret Wars Against Dissent in the United States by Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, 1990
The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage by Todd Gitlin, 1987
Introduction to Intelligence Studies by Carl J. Jensen III, David H. McElreath, and Melissa Graves, 2012
Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and the Press by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, 1999
Acid Dreams: The Complete Social History of LSD: The CIA, the Sixties, and Beyond by Martin A. Lee and Bruce Shlain, 1985
Last Man Standing: The Tragedy and Triumph of Geronimo Pratt by Jack Olson, 2000
Power to the People: The World of the Black Panthers by Stephen Shames and Bobby Seale, 2016
Murder in the Model City: The Black Panthers, Yale, And the Redemption of a Killer by Paul Bass and Douglas W. Rae, 2009
The Changing Metropolis by James E. McKeown and Frederick Inglebrit Tietze, 1971
The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and the Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther by Jeffrey Haas, 2011
The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover's Secret FBI by Betty Medsger, 2014
Terrorism and Tyranny: Trampling Freedom, Justice, and Peace to Rid the World of Evil by James Bovard, 2015
COINTELPRO: The FBI's Covert Action Programs Against American Citizens, Church Committee, book 3, 1976
Broken: The Troubled Past and Uncertain Future of the FBI by Richard Gid Powers, 2004
Black against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party (The George Gund Foundation Imprint in African American Studies) by Joshua Bloom, Waldo E. Martin Jr., and Waldo E. Martin, 2015
Make your own kind of music: A career retrospective of Cass Elliot ; featuring The Big Three, The Mugwumps, The Mamas & The Papas by Jon Johnson, 1987
L.A. Exposed: Strange Myths and Curious Legends in the City of Angels by Warren Beatty, 2002
Honorable Men: My Life in the CIA by William Egan Colby and Peter Forbath, 1978
Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA by Tim Weiner, 2007
Chief: My Life In The L.A.P.D. by Daryl F. Gates with Diane K. Shah, 1992
The Phoenix Program by Douglas Valentine, 1990
Herbert: The Making of a Soldier by Anthony B. Herbert, 1982
Heroes by John Pilger, 2001
Cover-up: The Army's Secret Investigation of the Massacre at My Lai 4 by Seymour Hersh, 1972
The Last Investigation by Gaeton Fonzi, 1993
A Farewell to Justice: Jim Garrison, JFK's Assassination, and the Case That Should Have Changed History by Joan Mellen, 2007
OSS: The Secret History Of America's First Central Intelligence Agency by R. Harris Smith, 1972
Big Brother and the Holding Company: The World Behind Watergate by Steve Weissman, ed., 1974
Call of Duty: My Life Before, During and After the Band of Brothers by Lynn "Buck" Compton with Marcus Brotherton, 2008



CHAPTER 8: The Lawyer Swap

Five to Die: The Book That Helped Convict Manson by Jerry LeBlanc and Ivor Davis, 1970
The Killing of Sharon Tate. With 8 pages of photographs. by Lawrence Schiller, 1969
The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer, 1980
The Scavengers and Critics of the Warren Report by Richard Warren Lewis, 1967
Legacy of Doubt: Did the Mafia Kill JFK? by Peter Noyes, 1973
Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy by Vincent Bugliosi, 2007
Manson in His Own Words: The Shocking Confessions of 'The Most Dangerous Man Alive' by Nuel Emmons, 1986
Roman by Polanski by Roman Polanski, 1984



CHAPTER 9: Manson's Get-Out-of-Jail-Free Card

Love Needs Care by David E. Smith and John Luce, 1971
White Hand Society: The Psychedelic Partnership of Timothy Leary & Allen Ginsberg by Peter Conners, 2010
Narcocorrido: A Journey into the Music of Drugs, Guns, and Guerrillas by Elijah Wald, 2001



CHAPTER 10: The Haight-Ashbury Free Medical Clinic

Dr. Dave: A Profile of David E. Smith, M.D, Founder of the Haight Ashbury Free Clinics by Clark S. Sturges, 1993
Child of Satan, Child of God by Susan Atkins with Bob Slosser, 1977
The Myth of Helter Skelter by Susan Atkins-Whitehouse, 2012
Ringolevio: A Life Played for Keeps (New York Review Books Classics) by Emmett Grogan, 1972



CHAPTER 11: Mind Control

The Mosaic of Contemporary Psychiatry in Perspective by Anthony Kales, Chester M. Pierce, and Milton Greenblatt, eds., 1992
The Last Goodnights: Assisting My Parents with Their Suicides by John West, 2009
Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry by Alfred M. Freedman and Harold I. Kaplan, eds., 1967
The Search for the "Manchurian Candidate": The CIA and Mind Control by John Marks, 1979
The Mind Manipulators: A Non-fiction Account by Alan W. Scheflin and Edward M. Opton, 1978
Project MKULTRA, the CIA's Program of Research in Behavioral Modification, Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence and the Subcommittee on Human Resources, U.S. Senate, 9th Congress, 1st Sess., Aug. 3, 1977
Human Drug Testing by the CIA, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Health and Scientific Research of the Committee on Human Resources, U.S. Senate, 95th Congress, 1st Sess., Sept. 20-21, 1977
LSD My Problem Child: Reflections on Sacred Drugs, Mysticism and Science by Albert Hofmann, 2009
Wolves, Jackals, and Foxes: The Assassins Who Changed History by Kris Hollington, 2015
Individual Rights and the Federal Role in Behavior Modification: A Study, Staff of the Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights of the Committee of the Judiciary, U.S. Senate, 93rd Congress, 2nd Sess., November 1974
Have a Seat, Please by Don Reid and John Gurwell, 2001
My Life On Trial by Melvin Belli with Robert Blair Kaiser, 1976
Dallas Justice The Real Story of Jack Ruby and his Trial by Melvin Belli and Maurice C. Carroll, 1964
Final Report of the House Select Committee on Assassinations, U.S. House of Representatives, 95th Congress, 2nd Sess., 1979
Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles by Peter Grose, 1994
General Walker and the Murder of President Kennedy: The Extensive New Evidence of a Radical-Right Conspiracy by Jeffrey H. Caufield, 2015
Passion for Truth: From Finding JFK's Single Bullet to Questioning Anita Hill to Impeaching Clinton by Arlen Specter with Charles Robbins, 2000
A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency by Richard Helms with Richard Hood, 2003
The Investigation of the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy: Performance of the Intelligence Agencies, Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence, book 5, final report: Senate Report 94-755, 94th Congress, 2d Sess., 1976
The Fourth Decade: A Journal of Research on the John F. Kennedy Assassination, Volumes 1-2 by Jerry D. Rose, 1993
The Plot to Kill the President: Organized Crime Assassinated J.F.K., The Definitive Story by G. Robert Blakey and Richard N. Billings, 1981
The Trial of Jack Ruby: A Classic Study of Courtroom Strategies by John Kaplan and Jon R. Waltz, 1965
Libra (Contemporary American Fiction) by Don DeLillo, 1988