Jack London Books

This is a spiral bound brief biography of Jack London. The format is unique with sections divided by tabs, however, the photos are an uninspired selection which is unfortunate because London's life certainly allowed for more. Aimed for the Junior High School market, but I think they missed the mark. Sorry.

Let me say that again: ughh.
A good book, all told, but exceedingly dull and almost impossible to get through. Apparently, Jack London's writing style does not suit me.

"When London Walked In Terror" is very interesting and entertaining -- but it is much like a teledrama in its departure from history, and its presentation of some legends and rumors as fact. "The Complete Jack The Ripper" by Donald Rumbelow debunks several items reported by Cullen (even mentioning Cullen by name at one point, seemingly irked that Cullen bought some of the second-hand material "When London Walked in Terror" presented as fact).

This book makes for a good story, but it's not a good history.

I felt this was a creative, fly by the seat of your pants theory, that was just as good as anyone else's guess. It's great!

I checked this book out, and found it to be of little worth. It is hard for me to believe that such an apparently emminent psychologist could possibly believe the preposterous theory he attempts to advance. Abrahamsen even quotes his own books as source material to back up his theories. It seems he takes great pride in having interviewed David Berkowitz (convicted "Son of Sam" killer) extensively, as he can't help but drop the name and details of that case incessantly throughout his writing; from what I've been able to gather, there's little similar between both cases. (I would hardly call the "Son of Sam" murders a "textbook" case of serial murder, though.) On the whole, a disappointing book. Read Sugden's "The Complete History of Jack the Ripper" instead...

This is by far the silliest Jack the Ripper book I have ever read (then again, I haven't read Richard Wallace's _Light-Hearted Friend_).

Dr. Abrahamsen purports to psychoanalyze the Ripper based on his crimes, and decides that the Ripper is really two men: HRH Prince Albert Victor Christian Edward and his tutor, James Kenneth Stephen.

His evidence? None. Really. Not even a little bit. This is hardly surprising, since research has shown that Prince Albert Victor _could not_ have committed the crimes; his movements are accounted for on every one of the murder nights.

With this piece of nonsense, Dr. Abrahamsen forfeits his right to be taken seriously, either as a psychiatrist or as an author

This is the latest effort to identify the Ripper that confuses interesting speculation for proof. The author's efforts to translate the addresses of the murders into an anagram identifying his trio of killers is ingenious but labored, and will remind students of the crimes of previous anagram solutions by John Wilding and the author, Wallace I believe, who fingered Lewis Carroll as the murderer. Much of it is written as if it's fiction, and the author does not even pretend to have sources that prove anything - instead reproducing marriage records that do not really establish his case. His focusing on Caroline Maxwell's sighting of Mary Jane Kelly after she supposedly died is interesting, but he never explains why Kelly allowed her whole plan to be jeopardized by such exposure after the murder - rather than slipping away under the cloak of darkness. Intrigued by the idea of Kelly as the killer? Track down the superb historical fiction novel, John Brooks Barry's The Michaelmas Girls.

There are a lot of people who still believe that Queen Victoria's grandson ("Eddy," the Duke of Clarence) was Jack the Ripper. They may have read about that theory in this book. However, much of the "support" this book presents for the theory is hand-waving. There are huge discrepancies -- for example, "Eddy" wasn't in town for most of the murders.

I read this book in high school for a history book report project. I think one reason I got a good grade on the report was because I pointed out that the author tended to ignore or brush aside facts that didn't fit his theory. By the way, I thought of giving this book two stars because it read quickly and because it was the first Ripper book I read. However, the facts were so misused that I cannot do so. If this had been published as a novel, I would have rated it much higher because it was so interesting. As nonfiction, it doesn't work.

If you read this Ripper book and don't read any of the better books, you are depriving yourself. There are much better resources out there. At the very least, visit the casebook dot org site. The realistic Ripper theories aren't as interesting as theories like this one, but at least they make sense.