The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer

 

 A story that might have been just interesting, Norman Mailer's treatment is superlative and rightfully won the Pulitzer Prize in 1980.  The Executioner's Song is the kind of book that is very long but not overly long, since it's endlessly fascinating.  The relationship between the notorious killer Gary Gilmore and Nicole Baker proves the old adage that truth is stranger than fiction.  One cautionary note about the book is that the content of the letters between Gilmore and Baker is most decidedly R rated.

Miscellaneous recommendations...

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt

Fools Rush In: Steve Case, Jerry Levin, and the Unmaking of AOL Time Warner by Nina Munk (Excellent)

ESPN: The Uncensored History by Michael Freeman

The Reckoning by David Halberstam  (About the auto industry, focused mostly on Ford and Nissan)

Mayday: Eisenhower, Khrushchev, and the U2 Affair by Michael Beschloss 

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering American on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson (Highly recommended; funny and interesting)

I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America after 20 Years Away by Bill Bryson

The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: A Memoir by Bill Bryson (Very funny book about growing up in Des Moines, IA in the 1950s)

The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America by Bill Bryson (Good but not great)

The Conquerors by Michael Beschloss (End of World War II)

The Last 100 Days: The Tumultuous and Controversial Story of the Final Days of World War II by John Toland

Car: A Drama of the American Workplace by Mary Walton (Truly fascinating story of the development of the second generation Ford Taurus)

This Republic of Suffering: Death and the Civil War by Drew Gilpin Faust

A Savage Factory: An Eyewitness Account of the Auto Industry's Self-Destruction by Robert J. Dewar

This is one of the most interesting books I have read on any subject.  The author worked in a Ford transmission factory in the late 1970s and his time there is the focus of the book.  Even if you're not interested in the auto industry, the human interest element alone is fascinating, if not outright shocking.
Buy "A Savage Factory" on Amazon

One Last Shot: The Story of Michael Jordan's Comeback by Mitchell Krugel

About Michael Jordan's first season with the Washington Wizards, this book is one big cliche.  The author's obsession with putting the word "Air" or "Third Coming" into every other sentence is distracting at first but soon becomes pathetic, and obscures some interesting if less than revelatory narrative.  Take, for example, the following: "...asking Michael if his success of the past two months proved to all the doubters that he had refilled his Air supply."  Also, what's with writing a book before the story is done?  Yes, there's a later paperback version with a chapter on Jordan's second and last season, but that's just a gimmick if you ask me.  Wait to write the book until the story can be fully told.
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Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer

It seems like everyone I mention this book to has already read it, so I won't go into much detail.  Probably the most notable thing about it is that Krakauer had only just become a bestselling author when he went on the journey to Everest, and the fact that he was intimately involved with such a fateful episode right after publishing Into the Wild is interesting to me.  The climb was originally supposed to be just the basis for an article in Outside Magazine, but Krakauer expanded it into a book when he felt that the length restrictions on the article had been too limiting.
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The Climb: Tragic Ambitions on Everest by Anatoli Boukreev and G. Weston DeWalt

An account of the infamous 1996 Everest expedition that resulted in several deaths.  Boukreev was a Russian guide with an American group that climbed on the same day as Jon Krakauer's group, so the book covers much of the same material as Into Thin Air by Krakauer.  Boukreev doesn't come off too well in Into Thin Air, but after reading The Climb, I tend to think he was inaccurately portrayed.  Boukreev, after all, saved several lives by himself while everyone else, from guides to Sherpas to other climbers, was either unable or unwilling to help.  As good as Into Thin Air is, I think The Climb does a better job fleshing out some of the details.
Buy "The Climb" on Amazon