You know when you’re watching a scary movie and you find yourself saying, “Don’t go up the stairs,” because you know what’s waiting for the final girlYou know when you’re watching a scary movie and you find yourself saying, “Don’t go up the stairs,” because you know what’s waiting for the final girl up there? Repeat that sentiment and innumerable amount of times and add a great deal of indignant revulsion for what happened to the women who were the victims of “Ethan Schuman” and that’s a large part of what it felt like to read this book.
The rest of it? It doesn’t feel like justice, but real life never quite does when it comes to injustices committed against women.
Reading the first half of this book had me nauseated as I immersed myself in how three women walked right into this trap almost any woman could have walked into and were, at first, psychologically manipulated and then emotionally abused by a sociopath who seemed to not want anything from but their attention and didn’t seem to care how much they were hurting. “Ethan Schuman” managed to break these women down even though they’d never even met.
The rest of the book is an angry and vulnerable look into how these three women tried (and ultimately failed) to bring the real human behind the “Ethan Schuman” persona to account for what had been done to them and many other women and how that person kept trying to keep and/or bring these women back into orbit.
When all else failed, one of them wrote a book. It’s really good.
Thanks go to Grand Central Publishing for providing me with a finished copy of this title via their influencer program. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you!
File Under: 5 Star Review/Memoir/Nonfiction/True Crime ...more
I was initially skeptical about reading and reviewing this book because the central victim involved is another All-American girl and it’s written by aI was initially skeptical about reading and reviewing this book because the central victim involved is another All-American girl and it’s written by a man who’s worked for two media outlets I completely despise (the New York Post and The Daily Mail). What made me change my mind is the fact that I’m always intrigued by the stories of disappearances that just don’t make any sense. So many people saw Lauren Spierer the night she disappeared. She was seen in multiple locations and on multiple cameras. There just happened to be no cameras in the last place she actually might have been, and then it was a handful of rich college boys who were all in that same spot and had enough time to cover their butts before anyone came after them with questions about what happened that night.
I would’ve been really into this book if I felt it wasn’t anything but a waste of everyone’s time, in the long run. It’s not that Cohen is a bad writer, it’s just that all the new “testimony” that Cohen collected isn’t really testimony: it’s more like anecdotes from friends, potential witnesses, and some of the potential suspects. None of this comes into play until far into the back half of the book.
Otherwise, the book feels rather repetitive, somewhat exploitative, and more than a little tawdry. I feel like there were some discussion topics that could’ve been explored here that would’ve contributed well to the book and to who Lauren was as a person but maybe weren’t approached, possibly out of courtesy to the Spierer family, but if you want to paint a portrait of a college girl gone missing, you should paint a complete one.
I was provided a copy of this title by NetGalley and the author. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. This review is rated three stars or under, which means it will not be appearing on my social media pages. Thank you.
Denise Williams and Brian Winchester were willing to go to the end for it, in a pact that had the potentiHow far would you be willing to go for love?
Denise Williams and Brian Winchester were willing to go to the end for it, in a pact that had the potential to destroy them both if they were ever found out, by planning and then carrying out the murder of Denise’s husband (and Brian’s best friend), Mike Williams. They would’ve gotten away with all of it if Brian and Denise’s personal demons hadn’t gotten between them eventually.
Turns out keeping a guilty secret this big for over a decade turns you paranoid and depressed. Maybe you can even delude yourself into believing you had nothing to do with it. Either way, the truth has to come out sometime.
True-crime author Mikita Brottman did an impeccable job with the research, writing, and pacing of Guilty Creatures (which is a fabulous title). Everything about this book, from the cover to the last page, is bathed in soapy, lurid, southern venality. Bottman takes advantage of the schadenfreude humor the public loves to read in regards to anything Florida and combines it with the everlasting love of seeing the pious revealed as depraved. There’s almost nothing that sells better than sex combined with religion. You would think all of this would make Guilty Creatures read as shallow, but it reads as compassionate to the victim, his friends, and especially his family.
Where this book tends to fall short is in examination of how the Southern Baptist Church, the Protestant work ethic, the myth of the American Dream, and the notion of Keeping Up with the Jones’ all likely informed not only the life and marriage of Mike Williams, but also the psyche and crimes of Denise Williams and Brian Winchester. Bottman is a psychoanalyst and missed a golden opportunity to really dig into how being very white and very American had a great deal to do with the why of these crimes. I would’ve loved to hear more about that. Otherwise it’s a great true crime read.
I was provided a copy of this title by Netgalley and the author. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you.
I love art heists. Well, I love the tales of art heists, really. In reality, I’m not really into the idea of stealing things that don’t belong to you,I love art heists. Well, I love the tales of art heists, really. In reality, I’m not really into the idea of stealing things that don’t belong to you, but there’s something so cool about the idea of art thieves, those daring people who seem to be able to make expensive works of art disappear into thin air. At the end of the day, though, all art thieves end up being are just regular thieves who happened to study their target very well.
Not Stephane Breitwieser, though. Stephane Breitwiser stole art because he was so struck by its beauty that he felt overcome by the need to have it close to him where he could admire it every single day. He never intended to sell it or damage it. Oftentimes accompanied by his girlfriend, Anne-Catherine, Breitwieser carried out more than two hundred heists over nearly eight years, stealing more than three hundred objects, making him the world’s most prolific art thief.
Breitwieser never used violence or broke into a museum to carry out a single heist: Every single object was lifted during business hours without harming a single person. Risks were sometimes taken, and close calls happened. In the end, Stephane and Anne-Catherine almost always simply strolled away from each scene, sometimes with several art objects on their persons.
Finkel does an excellent job of writing up how each heist was carried out, letting us readers feel the suspense, the stress, and the thrill of racing against the clock to obtain each object before the couple is caught by a guard, camera, or another patron. We get to feel the desperation that comes with quick-thinking when Breitwieser suddenly realizes the crossbow he has lifted can’t be smuggled out the front door like he planned, so he opens a window and drops it gently into some bushes below so he can retrieve it once he’s outside. And we get to feel Breitwiser’s disdain for poor security when art objects are put inside old cabinets that can easily be tricked into opening.
What’s most interesting is Breitwieser himself, who is at heart a momma’s boy who never learned the word “no” and never learned to do things for himself. It left him a loafer who never felt he had to work, which allowed him to live on government assistance and monetary gifts from his doting grandparents even while his mother and girlfriend worked and he reveled in his stolen hoard. He’s the definition of a self-serving narcissist, a man who must have the things he wants and what he wants is the only thing that matters. If he doesn’t get what he wants he slumps into episodes of what he might call depression but could also be described as pouting. He’s deluded himself into thinking he’s only borrowing these works of art and that he’ll give them back someday. He’s also deluded himself into thinking he’ll never be caught and that his loved ones will always stick by him, as is evident in what happened to his relationship with Anne-Catherine and his mother when he was finally caught.
In the end, The Art Thief is an entertaining and almost cinematic look at a man with a case of Peter Pan syndrome who saw the art world as his playground, his bedroom as Ali Baba’s cave, and thought he’d live happily ever after. Sadly, he’s just another man who needed to grow up.
I was provided an electronic copy of this title by NetGalley and the author. I was also provided a finished copy by the folks at A. A. Knopf. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you.
I have a bit of an obsession with the Pacific Crest Trail. I live so close to it. I can get to a trailhead in less than two hours, if I want. I had plI have a bit of an obsession with the Pacific Crest Trail. I live so close to it. I can get to a trailhead in less than two hours, if I want. I had plans to backpack a large section of it at one point (but then I was diagnosed with epilepsy and my doctors told me that wasn’t such a good idea) and that’s about 33% of the reason I wanted to read this book. Another 33% is my fascination with stories about missing hikers and the other 33% was based simply on the blurb. Then let’s just allow a negligible amount there just for me liking true crime. Let me tell you: This book is absolutely fantastic.
Andrea Lankford may be a former park ranger for the NPS that worked as a cop, an investigator, a firefighter, and a wilderness medic, but she’s also a very talented writer. I found her earnestness refreshing compared to some other writers in this genre and connected ones. Lankford lets us readers hear her vulnerability, frustration, exhaustion, fear, anger, regret, and more as she helps her compatriots search for lost hikers over the course of a few years. Lankford is level-headed and almost cynical after her years in the NPS and as an investigator, yet she can’t help but get wrapped up sometimes in the excitement of new technology that will help them search, or dive deep into research when a really good lead comes around. In turn, we also witness how dispirited and angry she gets when good money goes into resources that definitely weren’t worth it, watch as people get hurt or fall ill during searches, and look on as she sees the families of the missing hikers come around to the the same thing she already knows: that the government basically doesn’t have the resources to look for missing hikers and they usually don’t even care.
This book isn’t about Andrea Lankford, though, as fascinating as she is. It’s about the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT), the hiking culture, the main three missing hikers they’re looking for, how they all came together to look for them, how social media has both helped and hindered searches for missing hikers, about different methodologies to search for missing hikers, the dangers that come with being the searchers, how hard it is to resist following up on every lead even though you know it’s probably going to end up being a dead end, and the importance of knowing when it’s time to stop actively looking.
The stories told in this book are fascinating and the people are absolutely remarkable. There are some absolutely powerful and tenacious people in this book and some absolutely horrible people. There are startling stories involving wildlife and a complicated one involving a cult. There’s the dangers of cannabis farms, illegal opium poppy operations, wildfires, illegal mushroom hunting, and trail trolls. There’s also the majesty of Mount Rainier, the rainforests of Washington, the weird beauty of an abandoned Buddhist temple, the surprising tasty hardiness of a cult-made nutrition bar, and camaraderie over many campfires and glasses of wine.
All at once a biography of missing hikers, their families, and the people who search for them, a memoir of Lankford’s experience with this group, and a short history discourse on the PCT and hiking culture, you couldn’t ask for a book that will simultaneously entertain you and break your heart.
I’d like to thank Hachette Books for providing me a copy of the physical ARC of this book via their influencer program. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you.
File Under: 5 Star Review/Biography/History/Memoir/Nonfiction/True Crime ...more
This is a collection of essays about criminology and criminal justice I didn’t even know I needed. I feel like I’ve just been injected with a huge dosThis is a collection of essays about criminology and criminal justice I didn’t even know I needed. I feel like I’ve just been injected with a huge dose of knowledge that’s going to take some time to totally soak in, but it feels almost like a vaccine: now that I have read and know these things I can’t unknow them and unthink them. Honestly, I don’t want to. I would rather have this inoculation–this knowledge–in my system than not. Because I have taken a bite of this apple and even though that apple was bitter, I am all the better for that bitter apple. The bitterness will help me remember to stay angry and remind me of my sadness while reading some of these essays.
Evidence of Things Seen is split up into three parts: What We Reckon With (essays about the types of crimes that highlight the social inequities in this country and why they continue to be an issue); The True Crime Stories We Tell (essays about how social media intersects with true crime and how that can affect the time in which a crime is solved or how it can negatively affect the parties involved); and, Shards of Justice (essays featuring discourse on the future of criminal justice).
The first part of the book, What We Reckon With, is by far the largest section of the book, as it takes up almost half of the collection. None of the essays in this collection are bad, but in this section, I found that I was captivated and felt most passionate about an essay called “‘No Choice but to Do It’: Why Women Go to Prison”, by Justine van der Leun, which calls into question why women who are forced to commit heinous crimes by their abusers under extreme duress (like the threat of murder) are charged alongside their abusers as if they are just as guilty of the crime instead of the victim of one. “The Golden Age of White-Collar Crime” by Michael Hobbes is a long essay I thought would bore me (which is a point made about white-collar crime in the essay itself) but actually managed to ensnare me instead by explaining very well how is it that every time another old, white man gets arrested for doing something heinous with money and destroying a bunch of people’s lives all he seems to manage to get is a couple of years in Club Fed. It’s a long but rewarding read. “Picturesque California Conceals a Crisis of Missing Indigenous Women” by Brandi Morin reports on a phenomenon that’s well-known to anyone who lives in Northern California (which I do, though not as far north as she’s reporting on), and that’s the extremely high rate of indigenous Native American women who just up and disappear from reservation lands in the upper third section of the state. If you’ve ever seen the true crime docuseries “Murder Mountain” or read up on “trimmigrants” (the migrant workers, largely female, who make the trek up to the Emerald Triangle every year to harvest the marijuana crop), you might be familiar with how during harvest season it’s not only indigenous women who go missing. It’s a serious problem in general in Northern California; but for Native American women it’s so much worse, because they just get snatched up off their reservations and are never seen again.
In part two, The True Crime Stories We Tell, there’s only one essay I didn’t like too much, and that was “Who Owns Amanda Knox?” by Amanda Knox. The essay itself brings up plenty of valid points about how it feels sometimes that she has a doppelganger walking around that is the Amanda Knox everyone thinks she is instead of the Amanda Knox she actually is and that’s the Amanda Knox people keep thinking they can vilify and make money off of. The only reason I disliked this essay is because it felt a bit whiny. I understand she feels truly victimized after being wrongfully convicted by the Italian government twice, but she has her own podcast and a platform with which to voice her frustrations. I just felt like her essay wasn’t at the same level as the rest included in this collection. The other three essays in this section are all equally interesting and well-written.
In part three, “Shards of Justice”, the first essay, “Will You Ever Change?” by Amelia Schonbek completely floored me. It’s one of the best essays in this whole collection in part because it talks about restorative justice, which is one of my favorite rehabilitation tactics to avoid recidivism rates. In this case, the type of restorative justice they’re talking about is surrogate dialogue. Surrogate dialogue takes the victim of a crime and a perpetrator of the same crime (but a completely unrelated one), and puts them at the same table across from one another. Each of them has an advocate and there is a facilitator to keep everyone in line and stand witness for the non-profit running the program. In order to engage in this program, the victim has to approach the program themself and the perpetrator (who has to be out of jail and be evaluated before being approved for the program) has to want to use this surrogate dialogue to help victims heal. It’s a community service. I found this essay to be touching and thought-provoking, because even though programs like this show great potential to reduce recidivism rates, no one wants to fund them.
Another highlight of this section is “The Prisoner-Run Radio Station That’s Reaching Men on Death Row” by Keri Blakinger, which touches on how music is a universal language, even in prison. It’s a touching and emotional essay about how even the residents of Death Row, cut off from Gen Pop, can be part of the great prisoner community by being allowed to write into their prison radio station and have their words heard or their song requests played.
Don’t forget to read the introduction or the editor’s note. They’re both interesting and informational reads. The introduction has a whole lot to say about the late, great author James Baldwin, who was writing essays about how systemic racism ran long and deep in our criminal justice system long before anyone was willing to listen.
I was provided a copy of this title by NetGalley and the author. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you.
File Under: 5 Star Review/Anthology/Biography/History/Nonfiction/True Crime ...more
‘“Hey, you know what Waco stands for?” went one. “We Ain’t Coming Out.”’ - Quote from Koresh
The siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas t‘“Hey, you know what Waco stands for?” went one. “We Ain’t Coming Out.”’ - Quote from Koresh
The siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas took place when I was in my freshman year of high school. That was a landmark year for my family because my parents had finally saved enough money to buy us a brand-new house and we had moved in just the year before and were settling in. I was still an awkward, tiny girl with glasses and I knew there was something wrong with my brain but didn’t know exactly what it was yet. I just knew I wasn’t like other kids. I had a ton of friends, but I was also paranoid and insecure in my friendships. So believe me when I say, Waco was the last thing on my mind at that point in time in my life. Things like Ruby Ridge, the attack on the World Trade Center in 1993, and Waco wouldn’t become something I even gave some thought to until the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 (incidentally, I visited that bombing site in the summer of 1995 during a cross country trip and I don’t think I’ve ever felt so devastated before in my life).
Cults and cult leaders have been of great interest to me ever since I became interested in true crime in my late teens but David Koresh has been a topic I’ve largely stayed away from because of how volatile it can be and how much misinformation is out there about the events that happened at Mount Carmel. But Ruby Ridge and Waco are tied intrinsically to the alt-right and the fight against gun control legislation in the present day, so I felt it was time to go in and read something that might give me some insight as to how Waco ties into today’s arguments against gun control and just what went wrong during that siege that made so many people upset and paranoid.
I should note: I did not fact check this book or Talty’s research. I did not have the time to do so. I am aware there is a ton of conflicting research and books on Koresh and on the siege of Mount Carmel. I am also an atheist, so I may come off as dismissive or unconcerned with the Branch Davidians religious beliefs. This is not intentional. I deeply believe in the part of the first amendment where we get to practice whatever religion we want and also be free not practice any religion. I love the first amendment, full stop. I also should note I am pro gun control, in a very, very strong manner, so I will try to keep away from discussion about weaponry. I’m not here to fight. I just want to review this book.
I was very impressed with the first half of this book. In my opinion, Talty did an excellent job not only researching David Koresh’s childhood and family history, but he also did a tremendous job of humanizing the future cult leader. As a reader of fiction and nonfiction, I know how important it is to humanize the “villain”. David Koresh was a human being. His followers were human beings. His family are human beings. The survivors are human beings. None of these people just popped up out of a cabbage patch. Understanding David Koresh when he was just little Vernon Howell is absolutely vital to understanding how he ended up a dangerous and criminal cult leader. Reading the chapters involving Koresh’s childhood broke my heart, made me angry, and made me wonder just how many times there might have been a different choice that could’ve been made or a different way things could’ve gone that would’ve led little Vernon Howell away from the path that ultimately led him to Waco. We’ll never know, of course, but the sadness of a wasted life weighs on me, and it’s going to leave me thinking for just a while.
It’s when Vernon Howell joins the Davidians that the sympathy for him as a child begins to evaporate and turn into condemnation and sorrow: Condemnation for Vernon, and sorrow for those who fell under his spell or became his victims of sexual assault and/or abuse. It’s clear by this point that Vernon Howell had either not escaped the copious amount of serious mental illness that ran through his family or the severe abuse he had received as a baby, child, and teen had damaged his brain enough to cause some sort of traumatic brain injury that had never been treated. It’s another thing we’ll never know and can never be fully explained.
As much as I condemn the Branch Davidians and David Koresh for what they built, what they approved of, what they allowed David Koresh to do to their wives and children, and for their blind fanaticism, I was absolutely astounded at the ineptitude of the ATF and FBI.
Ruby Ridge, Waco, and the Oklahoma City bombing all took place before the formation of the department of Homeland Security (which wasn’t formed until after 9/11). Back then, the alphabet agencies not only didn’t share, they didn’t share well. If they were forced to share, it was a dominance fight every time. It was alpha males everywhere, banging their fists against their chests, all determined they were the best agency for the job and sometimes even willing to pull the rug out from under one another’s feet. Waco is an excellent example of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing and sometimes even the right hand is unsure of what its supposed to be doing and the left hand is just hanging out not doing their job and acting like frat boys. Up until reading this book I hated Homeland Security, but boy does this book make it look like an excellent idea. What Waco needed was interagency cooperation from the bottom to the top and a very, very clear chain of command. One chain of command. Instead, it seemed like there were about 3-4 chains of command running around and sometimes people were just guessing at what they were supposed to be doing.
Waco could’ve ended sooner and maybe even more peacefully if all these little boys had cooperated, shared information, and had one clear chain of command. Instead, there was chaos.
I did feel like the second half of the book wasn’t as interesting to read as the first, if only because a lot of the time it felt repetitive when reading the transcripts between David or Steve and either the negotiators or one of the other agencies. I’d swing from bored to angry at how our government was acting to sad because I knew how the story was going to end.
The book is a compelling read, especially if you’ve never read much about Koresh or what happened at Waco. What happened there changed the sociopolitical fabric of America that reached into the minds of people who are leaders of the alt-right today. It’s an important part of American history, and you should take the time to understand why this happened and why people have every right to be upset with our government’s part in what happened there.
Because, in the end, the Branch Davidians needed to be taken down, but they didn’t deserve what happened to them. They deserved to go to jail. And a large part of why everything went so wrong was because of our government and the inability to listen or to humanize these people. It’s an important lesson we all need to learn.
I was provided a copy of this title by NetGalley and the author. All thoughts, views, ideas, and opinions expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you.
File Under: 5 Star Read/Biography/Cult/History/Nonfiction/True Crime ...more
I started taking notes on this book, as I do with all nonfiction books I read and review, and I think the notes I took for Part One (which consists ofI started taking notes on this book, as I do with all nonfiction books I read and review, and I think the notes I took for Part One (which consists of the first four chapters) summarize my feelings about this book almost perfectly: “Slow, dry, and rather uninteresting. Doesn’t grab your attention and is told with about as much passion as a textbook.”
Look. I know we’re not going to be reading contemporary true crime here, with fresh memories and interviews from the people who were there. Those people are long gone now. But you can still write historical true crime and make it feel fresh, interesting, relevant, malevolent, sinister, scandalous, thrilling, and horrific even if it happened even before the times of the infamous Black Dahlia.
America loves true crime. Scratch that. America loves crime. We reads tome after tome about it, both in fiction and nonfiction. We watch endless movies, documentaries, docuseries, and procedural dramas about it. We use the internet to research forensics and pathology so we know how murderers get away with it. We listen to innumerable podcasts about it. Serial killers have fan clubs. There are reality shows dedicated to loving criminals, both in jail and out. Heck, when I originally graduated high school and went to community college I was a psychology major who had her eye on being an FBI profiler, and that was before “Criminal Minds” was even a glimmer in CBS’ eye (I was actually inspired by the TV show “Profiler”).
Keeping that in mind, If you’re going to write such an intensive and research-rich book about such infamous historical killers as Leopold and Loeb, you need to give your readers something more to look forward to than a book that reads almost as dry as a college textbook.
Sure, there’s some cool little inconsequential tidbits in here: the bit about future actor Will Geer possibly having a crush on Loeb, the fact that Leopold and I are both members of Phi Beta Kappa (the academic honor society with lifelong membership). There’s no denying the sheer time and energy put into the impeccable research done for this book is not only important but impressive shouldn’t be denied. In fact, if you value the research over the story of their lives and crimes you might enjoy this book more than I did. Sadly, I found myself constantly putting it down due to sheer boredom.
I also give appreciation where appreciation is due and applaud both King and Wilson for not flinching away from any of the less savory details of the case, or from the toxic and abusive homosexual relationship between Leopold and Loeb. While it’s pretty clear from research, interviews, evaluations, and writings that Leopold was a sadistic sociopath from early on in his life, it’s equally apparent Loeb was a pretty piece of prey left in the playgrounds of Chicago for Leopold to pick up and shape to his will. There was a master, and there was a servant.
All of this could have made for some captivating and compelling writing, propelling us readers through the investigation and trial, unraveling the folie a deux between this pair of entitled and privileged rich white boys whose parents had neither time nor inclination to actually parent their own children and left them at the not-so-tender mercies of people who had no business raising children, with devastating results. Ivory towers fall every day. And this book could’ve been so much better if it had told that story instead of this slow-paced and dry retelling of almost every moment of their lives in a completely linear manner.
This book has been reviewed as part of the #SMPInfluencer Program in connection with St. Martin’s Press. Thanks to St. Martin’s Press for providing me with the physical copy in advance in exchange for a fair and honest review. Due to the 3 star or lower rating this review will not be posted on any social media or bookseller websites. This is my personal policy as a ARC and book reviewer. ...more
This book is like a bombardment of missives and missiles launched all at once from one relatively slim package. “Bad City” isn’t the longest investigaThis book is like a bombardment of missives and missiles launched all at once from one relatively slim package. “Bad City” isn’t the longest investigative, true-crime novel I’ve ever read, but it sure does pack one heck of a punch for the words it contains.
But that’s what you get when you put a lifelong, seriously-dedicated investigative reporter who relishes the world of newspaper journalism (me too, for that matter) behind a keyboard and leave it to them to tell the story of how they came about catching and then publishing two of the biggest stories of their career (and the careers of several other people, too), both being intrinsically tied to the beleaguered University of Southern California (for the record, I’ve lived in California all my life and although I live in NorCal it’s kind of considered common knowledge around these parts that USC is corrupt. Sorry, but it’s true).
Journalists learn to pack as much of a message into as few words as they can. Column inches cost money, people! If you want the front page headline, you had better be sure your story is worth the extra inches those large, attention-attracting letters are going to cost the paper. This concise manner of writing is something I value greatly when I read investigative true-crime books like this. It reads like some of my favorite long-form investigative reports from Reveal News, but without the hyperlinks and infographics. It’s better for that, I think, because it allows someone like me (hello ADD) to stick solely to the words, to sink into the story and really inhale the inherent corruption that is Los Angeles (which is more Sin City than Las Vegas is, in my opinion) without any distractions. Not even a single picture graces the pages of this book and I am completely grateful.
Pringle may not be a creature born and bred in Los Angeles, but he understands the smog isn’t something that only hovers over the basin like a sickly miasma: Los Angeles is sickly, sallow city full of predators, prey, monsters, angels, the debased, and the innocent. Most of all, it’s full of the hilariously rich and the heartbreakingly poor. Los Angeles is a city full of symbiotic and parasitic relationships. It’s a beautiful city, full of beautiful people, but just like every Hollywood special effect, makeup design, or period costume, it’s all superficial. At its heart, Los Angeles is just like every other major metropolitan area in the world: an asphalt jungle full of people hungry for more of something: pick your poison. Pringle gets that, and that makes him an incredibly effective reporter. Well, that, and persistence: one of the most important weapons in a reporter’s arsenal. Pringle leaves no doubt in the writing of this book how doggedly persistent he and his fellow writers were while investigating and writing this story: persistent to the point of turning their entire paper upside down in pursuit of publishing their report without it being ripped apart by upper muckity-mucks who were obviously under the sway of conflict of interest from USC officials.
If I had a single complaint about this book it would be including, even if it was briefly, a small section on Operation Varsity Blues, the DOJ-FBI case that stretched across the country and implicated several private universities (including, most prominently, USC) and many rich (and sometimes famous) parents who used a “recruiter” middleman to bribe universities into accepting their children into their desired schools when their test scores weren’t up to par under the guise of them being athletes (even if they weren’t athletes at all). This book had more than enough scandal, sleaze, and salaciousness to cover between the two major cases it had already covered. Including Operation Varsity Blues not only seemed like overkill, but it also felt very tacked on. It felt like a puzzle piece that just doesn’t fit right. Like you think you have the right piece but it’s just a little too loose or a little too tight. It just should’ve been left out.
I’d like to thank Celadon Books for initially reaching out to me and offering me a finished copy of this book, since they were not sending out galleys and were only offering copies to certain readers who were still interested if they liked the first 50 pages. I liked the first 50 pages so much I immediately said yes. So thank you, Celadon, for this opportunity. ...more
Going into this book, it’s important to note that it’s not strictly a true crime novel. You might get the idea that it is, given that the subscript ofGoing into this book, it’s important to note that it’s not strictly a true crime novel. You might get the idea that it is, given that the subscript of the title starts off with the names of the now-infamous names of accused murderers Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell (neither have stood trial yet–they will stand trial together in a death penalty case starting in January 2023), but this book is as much a history, theology, and sociology lesson as it is a true crime story. I’m sure that after the trial has played out we will see a glut of true crime books about this case, but Sotille has jumped into the fray early by covering who Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow were, where they came from, what they believed, how they came to believe the things they did, and to cover all the players in their lives from their births up until their arrests.
In order to understand Daybell and Vallow, Sotille determined readers needed to understand the entire history of the Church of Latter-Day Saints (including all their splinter groups and controversies of differing kinds), cults of all shapes and sizes, the Book of Revelations (at length), Doomsday Preppers, and more. Woven into these dense lessons is the tale of how two people, both Mormon but raised on different fringes of the LDS doctrine, eventually wove their way through weird and self-centered lives until the day Lori Vallow sought out Chad Daybell at a book signing and captivated him with her beauty and charisma. From there, these two people become a perfect storm of power and influence over others that ultimately leads to self-delusion, mental instability, and criminal activity.
I felt myself kind of drifting away from the book during the denser parts, especially the very long section on the history of the Mormon Church, but that could be due to my own membership in the same church during my late teens (spoiler: I got excommunicated) and have a bias against a lot of their practices (also, I know a lot of the information the author was communicating). It was also a lot of information to be communicating in a dense block like that when a reader maybe wasn’t expecting a primer on the LDS church. But, as a reader, I can see where knowing that history was necessary to understanding both Vallow and Daybell. Their belief system played a huge role in who they were, who they became, and what they ended up doing.
In general, it’s a decent read if you want to know the background of the Vallow and Daybell case. If you are looking for strictly true crime, I’d wait until the trial is over and all the information has come to light.
Thanks to Hachette Book Group and Twelve Books for sending me a finished copy of this book! ...more
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