Serial Killers Books

This book will have you laughing out loud while thinking about important issues related to the criminal justice system. Alan Young has managed to find that difficult balance that eludes most authors of this subject. His writing is funny, intelligent, clever and thought-provoking (and sometimes obscene, though not in the legal sense). This book is not just for lawyers - it's for all of us who value our rights and our freedom to choose how we live our lives. Kudos to Professor Young for having the courage to speak his mind and to stand up to his profession, take a bow, and then spit in its face!

Astonishing! When I heard Alan Young on CBC's Here and Now Show, at first I thought he must be an unsuccessful lawyer ranting about the system. Then I found out that he's actually the same guy that defended Terry Jean Bedford in the 80's, and has all the important marijuana cases that keep hitting the news. And a Law Professor! Wow! When someone like this says there's something deeply wrong with our criminal justice system and the way lawyers are trained, I take notice. I bought the book a couple days ago and couldn't put it down. I always thought that there was some barrier and even mystery between lay people and the law, Alan Young confirmed my thoughts, and explains why. It's not me, it's the system. This book is a wake up call for Canada, and should be a turning point for change. I wish it was requisite reading for every citizen, politician, law student, police officer, and judge. Why aren't there more laywers like this?

Can you imagine being a student, no more than the age of eighteen, and involved in communications with a serial killer that's past victims fit your description? Amazingly, Jason Moss pulled it off. Putting his own life on the line, he successfully entered the lives and minds of several different serial killers including John Wayne Gacy whom he got the closest to. Other than being down right crazy and unbelievable, it offers a view that the public is often not shown of serial killers. Included are pictures of himself with Gacy and others as well as pictures from the original crimes.

This book is a true life, thrill ride from beginning to end. Once you pick it up you absolutely cannot put it down. Although the book is a great read, I do not recommend it for the faint of heart due to its violent and explicit content. It gets very graphic at times. Any true crime fan should definitely read this book. It's well worth the time.

Jason, at the age of 18, wrote letters to various serial killers in jails around the United States, construing his personality in such a way as to lay a mental trap for those in prison, in hopes of a response. He received many letters in return, as each predator innmate, including John Wayne Gacy and Jeffery Dahlmer, sought him as a troubled youth in need of their advice.

You won't be able to put this down. I read the whole thing in one night. Copies of the letters received from the innmates are in the book, including phone conversations that occured with John Wayne Gacy. Jason Moss ended up visiting Gacy in prison... and the end of the book records an incredibly frightening experience...

A great read! I very much enjoyed this book. My son was a victim of Shaken Baby Syndrome and I've often wished that there was a book to further educate the public on the harm shaking a baby causes. Despite all my research on the matter, I was unaware of the history behind how SBS was discovered and this novel brings that to light. Every high schooler should be required to read this so they would know to never shake a baby!

One of the most professionally challenging problems facing those of us who seek to protect children from abuse and neglect is abusive traumatic head injury, otherwise known as Shaken Infant Syndrome, Shaken Baby Syndrome or Shaken Impact Syndrome. Regardless of what one chooses to call it, the reality is that frustrated or angry people who unleash these emotions on infants will, as part of this, shake them. Theyt may slam them or otherwise impact their heads, but they do, indeed, shake them. Prior to John Caffey's descriptions of the Whiplash Shaken Infant Syndrome in 1972, this was not widely known. It was well understood that by impacting the infants head with an object or impacting the head onto an object, you could cause serious head trauma. John Caffey "put it all together" and a major part of how he did this was the confessions of Virginia Jaspers.

"Lilacs In the Rain" is the riveting story of Ms. Jaspers and the infants that she abused. It describes how she became a notorious child abuser, and how the system at that time was blind to the abuse. Most of all, it describes how individuals, sometimes working against the system, can make a real difference in the welfare of Children. It puts into perspective the period of time when the protection of children was dawning on the medical profession.

James Peinkofer, who is a recognized expert in the field of Shaken Baby Syndrome, has done an excellent job in piecing together the puzzle of Virginia Jaspers. All protection professionals, as well as concerned parents, would enjoy reading about his important piece of our history.

Stephen Lazoritz, MD
Co-editor, "The Shaken Baby Syndrome: A Multidisciplanary Response"
Co-author, "Out of the Darkness: the Story of Mary Ellen Wilson"
Co-authot, "The Mary Ellen Wilson Child Abuse Case and the Beginning of Children's Rights in Ninteenth Century America"

For those interested in the 'Ripper' saga, or just in the Victorian period in general this book should find a place on your shelf. An excellent, and much needed compliation.

What can you expect from the editor and mastermind of casebook.org? - certainly something every person interested in the whitechapel murders should have on their bookshelves.

Stephen P. Ryder didn't just write a ripper-book about the case in general, because we already have plenty of those. He picked a topic which gives some really good inside information on how Londoners reacted to the killings that happened right in front of their porches - Letters, sent from various persons, some known, most of them completely unknown, to the editors of the leading London newspapers, telling in their own personal words how the killing spree of Jack the Ripper influenced their daily lives.

The chronologial order of the letters helps to get a good feeling how the fear and terror rose among them, the more victims the perpetrator took.

Ryder also gave several of these writers a face, as the book contains lots of photos and illustrations. The text layout is perfectly readable and if you have read enough for one day, it's no problem to continue the next.

GET IT!

This second installment in an expected trilogy lived up to my expectations. From the first page, I was sucked into the rapid development of the plot and characters. Very vividly written with lots of action and suspense--a dark tale, but one that doesn't go over the edge into unbelievability.

I started it the other night about 10 pm. & then had to stay up 1/2 the night to finish it! Great book; very dark...

After twenty-five years of probing serial murders, interviewing killers and their families, neighbors, and surviving victims, author Jack Levin has become an expert on the topic - and here translates his expertise to a series of lessons identifying the mind of these killers and how their murders occur. Any college-level collection strong in enforcement books will find this an invaluable tool to understanding the psychology and activities of these killers.

Levin's new book is a kind of summering his knowledge on serial killers for many years. The author explain the phenomena and its multiple faces to the academic reader as well as for the common readers as well
This book is not of a theoretical but a descriptive of the many kinds and reasons of serial killers. The personal touch from Levin knowledge and acquaintanceship with so many cases of serial killers give the reader a global picture of the phenomena, and make the reader feel as he himself knew this killers.

This book gave me nightmares.
That has never happened before.
I have long given up on horror movies as I searched and searched for something that might frighten me.

The stories/facts in this book are true and they are utterly horrific.

Daughter/Girlfriend going "Travelling"....give her this book first.

It should be compulsory reading.

Reading books like this is always very sad. You are always thinking of the victims ends, snuffed out in their prime with their whole lives ahead of them. But the book is mainly about the trial of Rose West- did she, didn't she? Without deciding for you either way there is no doubt that the trial was a bit of a farce and that 'innocent till proven guilty' is a phrase used so often by society as word service to the judicial system that for all intents and purposes it has become meaningless. When a police force backed by society hatred and anger is trying to prove you guilty then you HAVE to prove your innocence in order to fight. Proving her innocence Rose West failed to do but so too did the prosecution fail to prove her guilt. If she was guilty because she 'must have known' then so are other members of the house guilty. There were hundreds of missing bones from the several victims which points to the dismemberment of the bodies happening away from the house and this indicates Fred Wests need to keep things secret from Rose. What makes me angry about this book is that Rose West could indeed be guilty but the trial never proved it one way or the other. Also, it shows that with Fred Wests suicide, the police and society, needing an outlet still for the rage, turned on Rose West like they had Derek Bently many years before when the real killer was too young to be legally prosecuted. A disturbing aspect was the tabloid journalists supplying schoolchildren with eggs to pelt Rose Wests police van so they could photograph it as she was driven off to court before being tried. Also one of the daughters getting offered hundreds of pounds by a newspaper for her inside story and then paid thousands when she added a page full of maternal abuse. This is a book that makes you think. My conclusions afterwards are that it seems so difficult to find the truth in these situations that society is not helped by the judicial system behaving maliciously and incompetently, and governments pandering to the mob by allowing journalistic interference. As I said, the book doesn't show Rose Wests innocence, it only shows that the trial was a farce.

This book is probably meant to frighten readers. From its cover illustration of a poor soon-to-be-victim running down a dark alley being chased by a madman, to the blurb on the back cover that reads, "So you think you'll never be the vicitim of a serial murderer? Don't be so sure", Michael Newton's encyclopedic "Still at Large" is a scary look into the world of serial killers and their unsolved crimes.

The author has researched crimes globally to give us a jam-packed thriler with over 180 entries listed alphabetically by either the presumed killer's nickname or the region where he/she did the killing.

Some crimes are well-known and now solved, like the Green River prostitute murders of the Seattle, Washington area. Gary Ridgeway has now been found guilty of the crimes which plagued investigators for years.

Another famous elusive killer has now been brought closer to justice as the BTK murders have been attributed to an unassuming man named Dennis Rader.

Still, most of the cases in this book are still unsolved. Some are so old that even if the killer is "still at large", there hardly seems to be reason for the public to worry about becoming the latest victim. And even though this book refers only to the 20th century's serial killers, there are many mentions of London's "Jack the Ripper", who terrorized prostitutes in the late 1800s because so many men have taken up where he left off and have also gotten away with it.

This book is chilling in its depiction of unsolved crimes and will have you looking over your shoulder. However, it is sometimes a little insensitive, I believe, toward victims because it is such a compact roll-call of killers. Most victims end up mere names in a laundry list of murders, with lines like, "the next to die was known junkie/hooker...", which I see as a little cold. That person was still somebody's daughter or friend.

Overall, Newton does a pretty good job of handling the victim situation. No matter how hard authors try, victims are usually secondary to the infamy and celibrity of a killer, even an unnamed one like the "I-45 Killer" or "Frankford Slasher".

I was impressed by Mr. Newton's research. He even discredits other writers of true crime who he feels have stretched the truth by either adding numbers to a victim list or making up murders altogether. It kept me from buying a book by one such writer, and I am grateful!

Read this book if you are a true crime buff- it's a keeper!

Still at Large is like a medium sized (299 pages) encyclopedia from the infamous to relatively unknown crimes. Listed A-Z from the "Alphabet" murders to "House of Horrors" murders to The "Zodiac".

It has well known crimes like The Zodiac, Bella Kiss, Kingsbury Run murders (The torso killer) and MANY MANY lesser known crimes: 195 in all!
Like the mystifying BTK strangler (bind them, torture them, kill them) who terrorized Wichita Kansas. Leaving police a message: "How many more do I have to kill, before I get my name in the paper or some national attention?"
Or the Mons Murders of Belgium where the killer dumped his victims at sites with names like: Rue de Depot (Dump street), Chemin de L'Inquietude (The path of worry) or beside the rivers Haine (Hate) & Trouille (Jitters).

Some stories are just half a page long, and others are 2-4 pages. It's clearly written with good detail & very interesting. No pictures or illustrations, just the stories. A great collection of strange unsolved crimes ranging in time from early 1900's to late 90's & from all around the world. For anyone who loves mysteries.

You'll notice some of the listed unsolved stories have now been recently solved, like the "Spokane Murders" (Robert Lee Yates jr.) & The Spotsylvania child murders (Richard Evonitz)..but most of them are "Still At Large"

As someone who works with troubled teens, I can see characteristics to watch for those who may be more disturbed than I had thought. This book is very important for anyone who has the opportunity to identify one of these monsters before they can destroy people.

I was riveted and kept reading about the terrible people who are so primitive and savage. Reading about the 'Pairs' was very scary. When two people are egging one another on to do even more terrible things, the result is even more horror.
Dr. Kauflin is right on the mark with her book and I suspect that she will become a consultant to police departments all over the world with her expertise. Meanwhile, I will be waiting for her next book.

Therapy girl

...when I realized that not a single person reviewed this amazing William Phelps Short.

As soon as I got over that, I had to rush and pen my official Review.

Two dichotomous elements in Mr. Phelps exhaustive work which need pointing out before I launch headlong into my whole "ADM Review Routine."

1) Amy Archer-Gilligan was probably the first-ever "Black Widow" (a woman who murders her husbands) on the official record. Mr. Phelps has done a masterful job of pointing this fact out, and he mentions it in passing somewhere in the work.

2) Archer-Gilligan was also--ironically--the pioneer of today's modern-day private medical facility. Her murderous ways--seeing as she was convicted of second-degree murder, read on--pit her as one of the US' most twisted "entrepreneurs" sisters from what I've read ever read. I'm sure she wasn't the first, but Phelps depicts her story in such vivid detail, that she might as well have been.

~~~~

Okay, moving right along to my Review.

Mr. Phelps' source notes are splendid!

I admire Phelps for his thoroughness, and thank him generously. I've done my fair share of reviewing on this Program, and I believe this to be the first times I've ever seen ENDNOTES attached to an Amazon Short!

Power to the decisionmakers, Mssrs. Hart and Slater, for having the foresight of including Mr. Phelps' works on the roster. Many thanks.

Phelps writes with a delectably compelling style. Like a harpie, a Siren, or a famished human scrambling toward a summertime well-stocked pantry after a long sojourn (of choice, or by compulsion) in the wilderness, each sentence of M. William Phelps' lines draw you in like fishing twine.

He writes in a no-nonsense unassuming style, and he doesn't throw immense $20 words at his readers that demand the utmost in their concentration.

AMY ARCHER-GILLIGAN is a story all about Archer-Gilligan (notice how we negtively memorialize on our villainnesses? If they've been convicted, then we neglect to include the formal prefix of "Mrs." [there was no "Ms." in those days]? I just thought I'd mention that, tangentially).

Phelps cleaves tightly to the strong non-fictional narrative line. Kudos. The sheer volume of turn of the 20th-century material suggests that there are far more stories from that period that have hardly seen the light of day.

All that we basically know from that time are the shallow reams of chronicled information which permeate our history textbooks. But the turn of the Old Twentieth was a time of vast potentials. It was a time for major and rapid industrialization, which also brought along its share of concerns for those were too busy sampling new things and new techniques.

Mass production was untested and untried, and stories which more accurately reflect this time perhaps need to be written. There is a huge knowledge gap which is sadly misunderstood. Dareisay it's misconstrued.

But when will this happen?

Phelps does a skillful job of cutting into this hump, which historians would just as soon prefer to relegate to an antiquated slagheap.

Archer-Phelps is like the worst incarnation of a Kathy Bates character in a Stephen King novel adaptation, like 1990's Misery, for example. It was a shocking film at the time, and I can just horrify myself to bits fantasizing how utterly passive-aggressive (the more frightening of the serial killer type) Amy Archer could have in her day, if Bates' character in MISERY were any ready-made example.

A small bundle of tremendous dread, she was indeed a wolf in sheep's clothing (and thank you Mr. Phelps for not even trying to use that bandied-about cliche!...I can't exactly recall the expression you'd used, but it was more powerfully rendered).

I've got a couple more stories here in my satchel to read from you. I'm looking forward to it. I've come across yet another amazing author, thanks to Shorts.

Indeed, the psychological underpinnings for what makes Archer tick are intriguing in the extreme...from a sociological/intellectual standpoint, of course. I, for one, would be heartily pleased to read a full-on treatment of your work.

I know this mightn't say much, considering that I'm only one person who's reviewed it (the shame!), but it's certainly a single opinion you can rely upon. If you send it, Review will come.

My best wishes to you from Prague, the Golden City, in today's modern-day Czech Republic.

-- ADM