A MIRROR OF MURDER

Paperback. A survey of the patterns of murder over the past 250 years - including a detailed analysis of the sick murder and sex crimes of the present age, and an attempt to relate it to the social climate of the times. Moving from the cruel flogging of apprentices in the 18th century and the murders of servant girls in the 19th through the passionate poison dramas of the Victorians, we come to the modern age of murder with Jack the Ripper, the forerunner of sick, motiveless crime. Then there are Peter Kurten, whose appalling crimes in Dusseldorf in the 1930s are seen in detail, the Black Dahlia, a strange and horrible tale from Hollywood, Gordon Cummins, the wartime Ripper, and several others whose terrifying activities spring from the deepest nightmare of the human mind. Illus. + Bibliog. 286pp. mass market p/back. With a personal b/plate, browned pp. some of which are sl. loose. Very scarce. G+