the serial killer files by harold schechter

He flat-out lies and claims that there's no proof that porn negatively impacts it's viewers-a claim that has long since been disproved through various studies (to be fair, this book was published in 2003, the year these studies were being performed or just coming out). In a section discussing the various elements of culture that society often blames for crimes, he defends pornography with all the vitriolic rage of a Red Pill poster. Pushing the author's obvious lack of talent aside, he also can't stop himself from injecting his own opinions and attempting to pass them off as fact-which is simply unacceptable in a work of nonficiton. He talks about these guys so often that he often resorts to repeating their stories without adding new details-padding the novel in a way that doesn't hide his lack of skill. He also shows almost fanboy-ish levels of interest in a select few of offenders, his favorites being Albert Fish, Jeffery Dahmer, H.H. He also can't hide his lack of skill with writing when he grossly sensationalizes these crimes, often using poor word choice to make the horrific crimes seem as if the author finds them sexually tantalizing. He notoriously uses the same descriptors over and over again (most notably 'psycho' and its variables, as well as 'savage', 'slicing' and 'the annals of crime.' Without hyperbole, he uses the word 'psycho' at least once almost every single page. I feel like he wanted to be a successful fiction author but just didn't have the chops, hence leading him to write subpar nonfiction like this. The biggest, most obvious annoyance I have with this book is that the author is straight up bad at writing. There's more cons than pros with The Serial Killer Files, that I almost don't know where to start. However, once I brought it home from Barnes and Noble, I was just about instantly disappointed.

As a fan of true crime, I was so excited to read this book.

The serial killer files by harold schechter