Lock your doors and bolt the windows!

Author's Rating:

Pros: Great serial murderer fiction any reader would like

Cons: The first few chapters are slow and hard to get thru, but they set the plot for a great book

Author's Review
For anyone out there who enjoys the fear and suspense of a great mystery or horror novel this has the best of both worlds. It is a fictitious tale of a serial killer loose in New York City around the turn of the century. It has everything a novel needs to become a classic in my opinion. Caleb Carr outdoes himself in this thriller that pits a prominent but unconventional psychologist against a ruthless child killer and someone inside the police department that wants the case dropped.

This book does such a good job of drawing in the reader in because he mixes his story with our own history. This gives the book a great sense of realism that you can't get with fiction alone. He adds in the poverty of the time, the lack of interest in the murders by the police, and several other factors that make you believe this might have actually happened. Truth be told, I thought it was a true story at first.

The main characters are fictitious but there are also supporting characters and references to others that a real historical figures. Two of these being Jack the Ripper and Theodore Roosevelt. Mr. Carr also has a great ability to create great depth in his characters and releases new information about them as the story progresses.

Another great thing about this book is that amazing detail put into setting the scenes and the descriptions of the murders themselves. He has done extensive research on the subject of criminal psychology and forensic science and where these studies were at the beginning of the 20th century adding yet another level of realism to the book. His knowledge of unconventional detective work such as profiling and fingerprinting at that time has impressed me tremendously. these might be common practices now but they were laughed at by most polices departments a hundred years ago.

There is only one drawback I can think of to this book is that you really need a fair bit of knowledge in the area for forensics to catch what the characters are talking about sometimes. I suggest you keep your dictionary handy just in case. Please don't let that stop you from reading this book though. It is a wonderful murder suspense book and not reading it would be the greatest crime.