Of the two recently published books about high-profile serial killer Andrew Cunanan, writer Gary Indiana's Three Month Fever is easily the more intriguing. Maureen Orth's Vulgar Favors offers a thoroughly researched account of the killing spree, which, thanks to Cunanan's surprise suicide, left behind many unanswered questions. Indiana, on the other hand, doesn't let mysteries get in his way: Perhaps arrogantly and certainly dubiously, Indiana delves into Cunanan's thoughts, recreating scenes that only he and his victims could have witnessed. It's an approach that immediately discounts the book's non-fiction tag, but Indiana's artistic license in some ways helps put closure on the case, albeit a closure built around cloaked uncertainties. Indiana's last book, Resentment, was a novel based on the murderous Menendez brothers, so a follow-up based on another media-saturated event seems at first like a bit of a cash-in. But those looking for a quickie tabloid read may be in for a surprise. Like Truman Capote's In Cold Blood, Three Month Fever corrupts the voice of the journalist by making it sound better. Indiana is no dry beat reporter, so his research-distilled writing leans to the literary side of things. Indiana is, however, something of a detective, taking risks with his unfounded assertions as he pieces together Cunanan's odd tale. Indiana refers to his book as a pastiche, and there is something puzzle-like about the way Cunanan's life is pieced together. Yet the linguistic glue Indiana provides to make the story stick is always steeped in a distinct, if subtle, tone of uncertainty, even as it declares Cunanan's state of mind with the confidence of a confidant. This might not be the way it happened, Indiana opines, but it could be. And why not approach a true story this way? Much of America's fascination with serial killers focuses on that arbitrary, frequently invisible snapping point, as well as the basic truth that the only thing ultimately separating a killer from a non-killer is the act itself. Therefore, no matter what words or actions Indiana attributes to his subject, Cunanan was still a killer, and no amount of conjecture after the fact can alter his actions. If we can never definitively know "why," Indiana realizes, why not invent the answer? It's not good journalism, but it is good writing: Create the motive, develop your protagonist, and reap the artistic rewards. Though at times resembling a true-crime American Psycho, Three Month Fever is as valid an account as any. No matter how Cunanan led his life or why he killed his victims, what's done is done. The uneasy "facts" of his life are fair game, just colors on a palette used to paint a portrait whose final image has already been determined.