Psycho USA

May 14, 2012
Forget Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer. The ax murderers, poisoners, and generally unpleasant specimens of humanity whom Schechter (The Serial Killer Files) chronicles in this macabre collection of Americana are the ones who’ve faded from our collective memory. True crime expert Schechter (also professor of American literature and culture at Queens College in New York City) arranges his stories chronologically, each case examining the perpetrator and the crimes, with psychological analysis only if supported by experts. But beware, those with weak stomachs, of details like “the brains fell out in the cradle.” Two cases are of particular interest for their similarity to better-known events, one fictional and one not. Edgar Allan Poe is said to have based his short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” on Peter Robinson’s 1840 murder of Abraham Suydam, who was beaten and buried alive in Robinson’s basement. And although Polly Bodine’s name is known only to the savviest crime history buffs, she shares much with the infamous Lizzie Borden: both were accused—and acquitted—of “hacking two family members to death.” Schechter expertly dissects not only the details of the crimes but also what leads some homicides to become legendary while others fade from memory. Illus. Agent: Loretta Barrett Books.

September 1, 2012

Schechter (American literature & culture, Queens Coll.; The Devil's Gentleman: Privilege, Poison, and the Trial That Ushered in the Twentieth Century) presents meticulously researched retellings of selected once famous, now forgotten American murders between 1782 and 1961. The collection is most effective as an overview of the progenitors of modern-day serial killers. It is less effective as pleasure reading, since the first two-thirds of the cases follow the same pattern: American psycho commits brutal murder; murder site becomes bizarre tourist attraction; murder is bemoaned in news as the worst ever; murderer is caught and publicly hanged; hack writer sells ballad describing murder. Only toward the end of the chronology--when public hangings became socially abhorrent and asylums began to take some of the load off the gallows (so to speak)--do the stories grow more varied and interestingly gray. Many of the more historically significant cases are also treated in Schechter's 2008 True Crime: An American Anthology. VERDICT Schechter completists and die-hard historical true-crime readers will not be disappointed. Still, while Schecter tells it like it was, the older cases become progressively less engaging once you realize you know where they're heading.--Ricardo Laskaris, York Univ. Lib., Toronto

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