American Black Widow

Dangerous Women: True Crime Stories

By: Gregg Olsen

Narrated by: Karen Peakes

From the number one New York Times best-selling author of If You Tell comes the chilling, binge-worthy story of Sharon Nelson, the minister’s wife whose two husbands mysteriously ended up dead.

Colorado, 1976. When Reverend Mike Fuller and his beautiful wife, Sharon, arrive in the sleepy town of Rocky Ford, local residents think something’s off about the new couple. The God-fearing minister is gruff and cold, while charismatic Sharon has her husband wrapped around her finger.

It isn’t long before Sharon is charming her husband’s congregation and finds herself in a tryst with local, married optometrist Perry Nelson. After the affair ends both their marriages, Sharon and Perry tie the knot. But shortly afterward, Perry disappears. When his body is shockingly discovered the bottom of a canyon, his death is ruled an accident, allowing grieving widow Sharon to claim his substantial life insurance.

Trying to move on from the tragedy, Sharon soon remarries fireman Glenn Harrelson. But when the charred remains of Glenn’s body are discovered with two bullet holes in his skull, the police can’t help but question if both men dying in such mysterious circumstances is one coincidence too many....

Shocking, sensational, and gripping, this is the true story of the black widow Sharon Nelson, a must-hear tale of greed, sex, and murder in a sleepy Colorado town that will have true crime fans of The Staircase, American Mother, and Making a Murderer hooked from start to finish.

This book was originally published as Confessions of an American Black Widow and Bitch on Wheels.

©2023 Gregg Olsen (P)2023 Thread, an imprint of Storyfire Ltd.

Captivating story

I enjoyed the narration by Karen Peakes. She really draws you into the story and her use of accents and voices helps distinguish the characters. The story was good but the back and forth in the timeline didn’t flow so well for an audible. It made it a little bit confusing and kept making me think I somehow missed a chapter.

Great storytelling and narration.

Very captivating story. The narrator really gets into it. Not drab and boring like many audiobooks. It does get a bit R rated at times but great listen.

evil

The Killers are truly uncaring and evil. It is amazing that they got away with so much for so long.

ARGH!

This is one of those books where you want to slap somebody upside the head: the consistent bad choices, the overarching selfishness, the complete lack of self-awareness as a human being - GAH! The book itself is a bit confusing - are we being presented with a character for whom we should have some compassion or sympathy (that's how I took it, initially) but, by the end of the book, it's pretty clear that no, we are meant to judge (and judge rightly) the appalling behavior of Sharon and her 'mountain man' lover.

There are direct quotes from both, scattered throughout the book, and I can't see that there are footnotes in the print/Kindle editions to provide citations (from interviews with the author or ?) - in the prologue she is quoted, speaking about her life in prison: "I don't know how to do it with no conscience. I wish I could. It would make my time so much easier. What good has all of your goddamn wanting to be good and moral gotten you, Sharon? What has it gotten you?"

The woman is a delusional narcissist - she has not, in her adult life, made any choices consistent with wanting to be 'good and moral' and the fact that at some later point she claims, "I'm not a bad person but I've done bad things," is further evidence that her definition of 'good person' is fluid enough to include adultery, theft, and murder. Yikes.

Another great listen

Couldn’t stop listening to this! Gregg Olsen’s prose plus Karen Peake’s performance equals compelling. Time to start the next collab between these two.