This holiday season, do you find yourself surrounded by true crime fanatics, with their sunless eyes and notions about the link between JonBenét and 9/11? Do they insist upon bringing up the Macdonald Triad at every dinner party, making it difficult for your more reasonable guests to finish their aspic? If you show up wearing a turtleneck under a blazer, do they greet you with a hearty hail-Ted-Bundy-well-met? And have you absorbed their conspiracy theories and notes on psychopathy so thoroughly that, come midnight, you hear Santa Claus on the roof shouting, “Now, DAHMER! now, DOODLER! now, RIPPER and PICKTON! On, KACZYNSKI! on KEMPER! on, DONNER PARTY and AMY ARCHER-GILLIGAN!”?
Never fear. Getting your macabre friend a gift doesn’t have to feel like being attacked by the Foot Stomper of Nashville. Simply use this list to find a present you can place confidently into their hands as you say, brimming with holiday cheer, “Can we please change the subject?”
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Pins, Desk Sets, and Podcasts
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- For your angsty teen cousin who doesn’t care what The Man thinks:
A selection of fine enameled pins to wear on her jacket, like the Teddy Bundy (Ted Bundy as teddy bear, complete with fake cast), the Half Clown, All Man (John Wayne Gacy morphing into his terrifyingly “fun” alter-ego, Pogo the Clown), and the Hand to God (Richard Ramirez’s palm with a pentagram drawn on it).
From $9, depressiveghoul.com
- For your Type-A friend who’s rising up the corporate ladder at a speed you personally find disconcerting:
A beautifully-designed desk calendar featuring a different cult leader each month.
$19.87, DeadMeatDesign on Etsy
- For your brother who listens to so many podcasts that you’ve grown used to phrases like “he then cut out the intestines and draped them over her shoulder” coming out of his room after midnight:
Patreon subscriptions to all of his favorite podcasts, like Casefile, Sword & Scale, and Last Podcast on the Left. A few bucks a month will get him access to tons of bonus content, so he can finally become the man he was meant to be: a Ripperologist.
From $1/month, via Patreon
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Key Chains, Coffee Table Books, and Doomsday Agendas
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- For your elegant mother whose guilty pleasure is watching classic horror movies:
A sleek red keychain from the Overlook Hotel, Room No. 237. (Because all work and no play makes Mum a dull girl.)
$14.57, TheBuckShop on Etsy
- For the melancholic yet discerning man you used to date who recently mentioned that he’s just moved into a new mansion (and you wouldn’t mind an invitation to come over and drink scotch by one of his three (!) fireplaces sometime):
An elegantly haunting coffee table book, like New York Noir: Crime Photos from the Daily News Archive or Scene of the Crime: Photographs from the LAPD Archive, which has been described as “gorgeously lurid” and “morbidly arresting.”
From $45, via Amazon.
- For the writer in your life who’s constantly working on something ghoulish:
A paranoid notebook for all her New Year’s resolutions and/or blueprints for the apocalypse.
$5.30, DeadMeatDesign on Etsy
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Mugs, (More) Keychains, and True Crime Conventions
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- For the woman who has it all, except someone she can swap Golden State Killer theories with:
A ticket to CrimeCon 2019 (June 7-9 in New Orleans), where she can meet gaggles of shrieking true crime fans who are just like her.
From $329.00, crimecon.com
- For your little sister who’s moving to Los Angeles and you know she’s a strong independent woman who will be totally fine but you still worry about her now and then:
A keychain reminding her to lock her *&*#$&(*@#)! door (inspired by the podcast My Favorite Murder), with a personalized note on the back.
From $12.60, simplestamp on Etsy
- For the future criminal profiler/private eye/toxicologist in your life:
A coffee mug that shows the world just how important true crime is to them. (How important? Terrifyingly important).
$15.99, chairbread on Society6
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Books and…Well, You Probably Don’t Want to Know
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- For your ex who has gone on to have an untroubled life and needs to be reminded that THERE’S DARKNESS OUT THERE, OKAY?! THERE! IS! DARKNESS!:
A single .zip file containing the transcripts of the confessions of Jeffrey Dahmer and Ed Gein, with nary a nipple belt or tibia bone left out.
$15, serialkillersink.net
- For the true crime esthete who’s in it for style, not substance:
A couple of gloriously pulpy vintage crime publications, like old Perry Mason books (how will you ever choose between The Case of the Vagabond Virgin and The Case of the Cautious Coquette, though?), some stunningly designed 1970s Agatha Christie, or a compilation of lascivious midcentury “detective” magazines (Crime Detective, Uncensored Detective, Inside Detective, Real Detective, and True Detective—oh my!)
about $5-$20, Etsy and eBay
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Happy holidays…and Godspeed.
