Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

Part One: Childhood

Chapter 1: Growing Up

Chapter 2: A New Relationship

Chapter 3: Wild Lives

Part Two: Crime

Chapter 4: Planning

Chapter 5: Execution

Chapter 6: Caught

Part Three: Sentencing Hearing

Chapter 7: Incrimination

Chapter 8: The Hearing Begins

Chapter 9: The Hearing Ends

Part Four: Prison

Chapter 10: A New Code

Chapter 11: Turbulence

Chapter 12: The Prime of Life

Chapter 13: Loss

Chapter 14: Depression and New Hope

Chapter 15: Image Rehabilitation

Chapter 16: Parole

Part Five: Freedom

Chapter 17: A New Life

Chapter 18: Emerging from Seclusion

Chapter 19: Freedom

Chapter 20: Notoriety Becomes Celebrity

Chapter 21: High Life

Chapter 22: Decline and Death

Conclusion

Bibliography

About the Author

Index

About the Author

Erik Rebain is an archivist who works for the Chicago Tribune and Chicago History Museum. He has spent seven years researching the life of Nathan Leopold in over forty archival collections across the United States.

Reviews

Arrested Adolescence is an engrossing account of one of the most sensational crimes of the 1920s. Through meticulous research, Rebain gives us a careful and astute retelling of the life of Nathan Leopold, his 'crime of the century, ' and his life after prison. What emerges is a complex portrait of a privileged and gifted youth, a self-avowed hedonist, and an unapologetic conman, unspooling a life that has been layered in so much myth and legend for decades.--James Polchin, author of Indecent Advances: A History of True Crime and Prejudice Before Stonewall

Erik Rebain is the go-to expert on the Leopold and Loeb case. He has spent years researching the crime, and generously sharing his knowledge with fellow Leopold and Loeb obsessives. He brings a much-needed queer perspective to Leopold's later years, showing the ruse of his late marriage, his mutual admiration society connection to Roy Cohn, and the other gay power-brokers of mid-Century America. Leopold does not come across as sympathetic in any way, and yet he is also cleared of the actual wielding of the deadly chisel in this fellow-expert's mind. Methodically researched, and written with a clear eye, Rebain uncovers the life that Leopold created years after the Bobby Franks murder in tight, riveting prose.--Jill Dearman, author of Jazzed

Fascination with Nathan Leopold, and his partner in crime the 'evil' Dickie Loeb, seems to survive decades of changes in fashion and taste in celebrities. This volume usefully sheds light on Nathan Leopold's childhood and return to society after imprisonment. Crime and its reception always a mirror of its social context, when and where it happened, and later. --Leigh B. Bienen, senior lecturer, Northwestern University School of Law, and co-author of Crimes of the Century: From Leopold and Loeb to O.J. Simpson

In Arrested Adolescence, author Erik Rebain delves deeply into the life of Nathan Leopold, challenging the lurid portraits and self-serving narratives surrounding the infamous murderer. At the book's heart, Rebain wrestles with the question of Leopold's rehabilitation and whether he was truly a reformed man. Looking closely at Leopold's 33 years in prison and the 13 years in Porto Rico after his release, Rebain tells a new story, one that differs dramatically from Leopold's and his supporter's carefully crafted tale of redemption. Utilizing a vast array of archival materials, Rebain presents Leopold in all his human flaws, a man whose life, behaviour, and motivations could never escape his teenaged obsessions, entitlements, desires, and crime.--David S. Churchill, University of Manitoba, Canada

The case has been the subject of movies, documentaries, and numerous books. Erik Rebain, an archivist for the Chicago Tribune and Chicago History Museum, weighs in with a new, deeply researched biography of one-half of the infamous duo. Arrested Adolescence: The Secret Life of Nathan Leopold is the product of a decade of research and Rebain was in his element as he scoured dozens of archives for fresh material unseen for a century.... A century after the Jazz Age caught fire, its crimes continue to offer new insights and timely cautionary tales.-- "Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine"