In Cold Blood Chapter Summary & Analysis - Part 1 Summary

Part 1 Summary

The first part of In Cold Blood introduces the principal "characters" of the book - the Herb Clutter family and the two men who killed them - and follows the activities of each person on the day of the murder.

Author Truman Capote sets the scene by describing Holcomb, Kansas, the Finney County town where the Clutters are prominent citizens. A flat, windswept prairie town, population 270, it is unremarkable in every way - except for the murders that will take place there. Herb Clutter is the forty-eight-year-old owner of River Valley Farm, a large, prosperous operation containing several hundred acres of wheat and grains, as well as several hundred head of livestock. He is a frugal, no-nonsense man with Spartan habits, abstaining from all drinks with stimulants or alcohol and preferring a simple diet. On what will prove to be his last day alive, his breakfast consists of an...
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