True crime books

I liked "The Adversary: A True Story of Monstrous Deception" by Emmanuel Carrere. I also liked "Whoever Fights Monsters : My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI" by Robert Ressler. I don't know if I'm an avid reader of the genre, however, but these 2 are rather unique: the first is by a bona fide novelist, and the second by an actual investigator.

I love true crime books. Anne Rule is my favorite. Aphrodite Jones is also pretty good. The thing I like best about Anne Rule is that she seems very fair in her stories. She tells it like it is.

I started reading them a long time ago when a guy named Ronald Gene Simmons killed his whole family in Russellville, Arkansas. I just could not understand how something like that could happen. Once I read the book, I could see how he got where he did. It excused nothing, but his pathology became very clear.

Bitter Harvest by Anne Rule was very good. I like audiobooks and the woman that read this one made that villainess just leap out there! If anyone is into audiobooks, I must have 300-400 of them and would be happy to share them!

just bookmarking for now......

Those both sound interesting, yitwail, I'll have to look for those. Thank you!

I'm the same way, Momma Angle - these books seem to open a door into unimaginable ways to live. How people come to do such things is indeed fascinating.

I've never heard of Aphrodite Jones (but you gotta love that name). I'll look for her.

I think Ann Rule does a good job layering the story together. She writes mostly about the area I live in, the Pacific northwest, which adds another interesting angle.

I think the book that introduced me to her was "Dead by Sunset" which happened practically within spitting distance from my house.

I know there can't be too many people who call themselves "pueo" and live in Guam so I'm guessing you're the old pueo I knew from Abuzz.

Wow!

Nice to see you again. I'm looking forward to hearing your true crime favorites.

Dead by Sunset was amazing! Brad Cunningham was one of the most devious narcicissts! An angel until he roped the women in and then the devil himself emerged. Killing his wife in front of his youngest child was the most horrific thing I have ever heard of. Ken Olin played him in the movie. He was so good I almost thought he was that way himself!

Boomerang, I imagine you've read all the Ted Bundy books? The Green River killer also? The criminal mind fascinates.

Brains fascinate me anyway -- why people do the things they do, not just criminals but all kinds of people.

I read Rule's book about the Green River killer while on vacation this summer - my mom had a copy and it was too tempting.

Even though I followed Ridgeway's arrest in the papers I never got the feeling that anybody really understood why he did the things he did. Her book was a bit more enlightening but I am still completely baffled by him and what he did.

I know I must have read her book about Ted Bundy because I know they worked together but I think I must have read it before I was aware of who she was.

Have you read the book I mentioned "Starvation Heights"? It takes place in Washington state. It is unbelivable. What is it about the Pacific Northwest? Why do we get so many of these lunatics?