This article contains affiliate links. If you buy through them, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
The lawyer who defended Ronald DeFeo Jr. for murdering his own family later admitted, in a 1988 interview, that he and the Lutz family “created this horror story over many bottles of wine.” That confession from William Weber is the single most important fact in the entire Amityville Horror story, and it’s why this list includes both the bestselling book that made the haunting famous and the books that later took it apart. Read in order, they tell two different stories: the haunting as marketed, and the haunting as investigated.
| Book | Best for | Type |
|---|---|---|
| The Amityville Horror: A True Story (Jay Anson) | Readers who want the original bestseller that started it all | Nonfiction (disputed), 1977 |
| High Hopes: The Amityville Murders (Gerard Sullivan & Harvey Aronson) | Readers who want the prosecutor’s account of the actual 1974 murders | Nonfiction |
| The Night the DeFeos Died (Ric Osuna) | Readers who want the most thorough investigative debunking | Nonfiction, investigative |
| The Amityville Horror Conspiracy (William Weber & Roxanne Weber) | Readers who want the hoax confession straight from the source | Nonfiction |
| Murder in Amityville (Hans Holzer) | Readers who want the paranormal-investigator take on why DeFeo killed his family | Nonfiction (disputed), 1979 |
1. The Amityville Horror: A True Story by Jay Anson
Published in 1977 and based on the Lutz family’s own account, this is the book that turned a Long Island house into a household name, selling more than 10 million copies and inspiring the 1979 film. Anson wrote it from interviews with George and Kathy Lutz describing the 28 days they say they spent in the house after moving in five months following the DeFeo murders — before fleeing what they claimed was a campaign of paranormal terror.
2. High Hopes: The Amityville Murders by Gerard Sullivan and Harvey Aronson
Sullivan was the actual prosecutor who tried Ronald DeFeo Jr. for murdering his parents and four siblings in 1974, and this book is built from trial testimony and the prosecution’s own case file rather than the Lutz family’s later paranormal claims. It’s the book to read if you want the documented criminal case at the center of the story, separated entirely from the haunting that came after.
3. The Night the DeFeos Died: Reinvestigating the Amityville Murders by Ric Osuna
Osuna’s investigative book goes furthest in tracing how the supernatural story was constructed, arguing it began as a legal strategy connected to DeFeo’s defense and grew from there into what he calls a “cottage industry.” It draws on interviews and documents to reconstruct both the murders and the manufacturing of the haunting narrative that followed.
4. The Amityville Horror Conspiracy by William Weber and Roxanne Weber
Weber was DeFeo’s defense attorney and, by his own later admission, one of the people who helped invent details of the Lutz haunting — reportedly telling a reporter in 1988 that he and the Lutzes “took real-life incidents and transposed them” into the story that became Anson’s book. This is his and his wife’s own account of how that happened, making it the closest thing to a confession available in book form.
5. Murder in Amityville by Hans Holzer
Published in 1979, paranormal investigator Hans Holzer’s book takes a different angle, presenting itself as a prequel that tries to explain why Ronald DeFeo Jr. killed his family, built around Holzer’s theory that DeFeo was influenced by “evil forces” in the house before the murders. It was loosely adapted into the 1982 film Amityville II: The Possession, and, like Anson’s book, its nonfiction claims have been widely disputed.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1: Was the Amityville Horror a hoax?
DeFeo’s own defense attorney, William Weber, said in a 1988 interview that he and the Lutz family invented much of the story together, which is why books like The Night the DeFeos Died and The Amityville Horror Conspiracy treat the haunting claims as fabricated rather than documented.
Q2: What actually happened at the Amityville house?
The one undisputed fact is the crime: Ronald DeFeo Jr. shot and killed his parents and four siblings in the house on Ocean Avenue in November 1974 — the paranormal claims came later, from the Lutz family who moved in afterward.
Q3: Is Jay Anson’s book considered accurate?
It’s presented as nonfiction and was based on interviews with the Lutz family, but its claims have been extensively disputed, including by DeFeo’s own former attorney, so it’s best read as the version of events that was marketed rather than an independently verified account.
Q4: Were Ed and Lorraine Warren involved in the real case?
The Warrens visited the house about five months after the Lutzes left, and their involvement is generally described as minor and after the fact rather than central to the original claims documented in Anson’s book.
Q5: Which book should I read first?
Start with Jay Anson’s original book to understand the story as it was popularized, then read The Night the DeFeos Died or The Amityville Horror Conspiracy to see how much of it has since been challenged.
As an Amazon Associate, this site earns from qualifying purchases.
See more true-story horror cases in our Horror Movies, Gear & True Crime guide.
Comments