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Portrait of a Killer | 
 enlarge | Manufacturer: Berkley
Category: EBooks
List Price: $7.99
Buy New: $6.39
You Save: $1.60 (20%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  597 reviews
Sales Rank: 5247
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 400
Dewey Decimal Number: 364.1523092
ASIN: B000OCXILC
Publication Date: March 3, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
-No doubt there will always be skeptics, and critics tainted by self-interest who will refuse to accept that [Walter] Sickert was a serial killer, a damaged diabolical man driven by megalomania and hate. There will be those who will argue that it-s all coincidence. As FBI profiler Ed Sulzbach says, -There really aren-t many coincidences in life. And to call coincidence after coincidence after coincidence a coincidence is just plain stupid.-- (Chap. 2 p.14 para. 4) -Patricia Cornwell, Portrait of a Killer In the fall of 1888, all of London was held in the grip of unspeakable terror. An elusive madman calling himself Jack the Ripper was brutally butchering women in the slums of London-s East End. Police seemed powerless to stop the killer, who delighted in taunting them and whose crimes were clearly escalating in violence from victim to victim. And then the Ripper-s violent spree seemingly ended as abruptly as it had begun. He had struck out of nowhere and then vanished from the scene. Decades passed, then fifty years, then a hundred, and the Ripper-s bloody sexual crimes became anemic and impotent fodder for puzzles, mystery weekends, crime conventions, and so-called -Ripper Walks- that end with pints of ale in the pubs of Whitechapel. But to number-one New York Times bestselling novelist Patricia Cornwell, the Ripper murders are not cute little mysteries to be transformed into parlor games or movies but rather a series of terrible crimes that no one should get away with, even after death. Now Cornwell applies her trademark skills for meticulous research and scientific expertise to dig deeper into the Ripper case than any detective before her-and reveal the true identity of this fabled Victorian killer. In Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper, Case Closed, Cornwell combines the rigorous discipline of twenty-first century police investigation with forensic techniques undreamed of during the late Victorian era to solve one of the most infamous and difficult serial murder cases in history. Drawing on unparalleled access to original Ripper evidence, documents, and records, as well as archival, academic, and law-enforcement resources, FBI profilers, and top forensic scientists, Cornwell reveals that Jack the Ripper was none other than a respected painter of his day, an artist now collected by some of the world-s finest museums: Walter Richard Sickert. It has been said of Cornwell that no one depicts the human capability for evil better than she. Adding layer after layer of circumstantial evidence to the physical evidence discovered by modern forensic science and expert minds, Cornwell shows that Sickert, who died peacefully in his bed in 1942, at the age of 81, was not only one of Great Britain-s greatest painters but also a serial killer, a damaged diabolical man driven by megalomania and hate. She exposes Sickert as the author of the infamous Ripper letters that were written to the Metropolitan Police and the press. Her detailed analysis of his paintings shows that his art continually depicted his horrific mutilation of his victims, and her examination of this man-s birth defects, the consequent genital surgical interventions, and their effects on his upbringing present a casebook example of how a psychopathic killer is created. New information and startling revelations detailed in Portrait of a Killer include: - How a year-long battery of more than 100 DNA tests-on samples drawn by Cornwell-s forensics team in September 2001 from original Ripper letters and Sickert documents-yielded the first shadows of the 75- to 114 year-old genetic evidence that Walter Sickert and Jack the Ripper left when they touched and licked postage stamps and envelope flaps. - A comprehensive look at the physical evidence uncovered by paper experts including watermarks on the paper used by Jack the Ripper for his taunting letters to the police and to newspapers that matched watermarks and paper used by
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""No doubt there will always be skeptics, and critics tainted by self-interest who will refuse to accept that [Walter] Sickert was a serial killer, a damaged diabolical man driven by megalomania and hate. There will be those who will argue that it's all coincidence. As FBI profiler Ed Sulzbach says, 'There really aren't many coincidences in life. And to call coincidence after coincidence after coincidence a coincidence is just plain stupid.'" (Chap. 2 p.14 para. 4) -Patricia Cornwell, Portrait of a Killer In Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper, Case Closed, Cornwell combines the rigorous discipline of twenty-first century police investigation with forensic techniques undreamed of during the late Victorian era to solve one of the most infamous and difficult serial murder cases in history. medical procedures Sickert was forced to endure and reflects on the impact they might have had on the young boy. She also explores the ways in which women might have served as a dangerous reminder of his infuriating and humiliating abnormality. (Chap. 1 p.5 para. 3) ?
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| Customer Reviews: Read 592 more reviews...
 The Ripper unveiled, circumstantially August 25, 2008
Disturbing history of Jack the Ripper and disclosure of Cornwell's claimed resolution: The Ripper was Walter Sickert, an English artist who, claims Cornwell, painted some of the murder scenes in his art and wrote the Ripper letters to the police and newspapers.
The argument appears convincing, although Cornwell, a famous fiction murder mystery writer, uses too much speculation and circumstantial evidence.
Ultimately, if Sickert was the Ripper, as painted by Cornwell, the whole thing was very creepy. Don't read this book alone after dark.
 Utter disappointment August 23, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Why on earth did Cornwell spend a fantastically huge amount of money in order to produce this? Maybe I should get her to adopt me; I'd make better use of her funds.
Other reviewers have already mentioned her lack of sources, her erroneous DNA conclusions, and the like. One of the things that really caught me was her assumption that a dark lantern provided hardly any light at all, simply because she experimented with one. On her patio. Not in the East End of London. She claims that a dark lantern was NOT the brilliant, illuminating tool shown in contemporary illustrations, but a weak and hotly burning liability.
If that were the case, why would dark lanterns be issued to London's police force? Why would a lantern that, as Cornwell claims, can't illuminate an object only six inches away, be thought of as a helpful instrument? It wouldn't. Clearly, Cornwell's "test" was just as useful as the money she spent in "research". The $6 million dollar book. She'd have done better to try to create a bionic man.
knows hows to write August 11, 2008
this books is well constructed,and is very entertaining. i enjoyed it very much.i would recommend it to any one who is a real jack the ripper fan.most other books are poorly written and hard to follow,even for the most avid readers.
Horrible Nonsense July 18, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
There is not a shred of evidence linking Sickert to these killings. All Cornwell does is try to prove it's "not impossible" that he did it. Totally unconvincing. Cornwell should stick to fiction, where this book belongs.
 Case Most Certainly Not Closed July 5, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Cornwell has some serious hubris to come to, and stick to, this conclusion. Let us hope that she is never run up on charges backed by as little evidence as she presents in this wild goose chase. I understand the case is about as cold as they get a hundred years after the fact but the very circumstantial leaps of faith she builds her case with is very laughable and not even the basis of an indictment let alone a conviction. Now Walter Sickert [yeah, a name made to order] may have been a tyrant and misogynist but these are not crimes. In fact a lot of artists are these things, fueled by their own self import and ego but that doesn't make them murders.
The most likely explanation tends to be the correct one, which is that Jack was a nobody [not a nationally known artist with several biographies to his name]. And it is most likely that he died in 1888, was committed, or imprisoned for other crimes. Sickert was none of those things, if he was even in London at all during the canonical five murders. Cornwell goes on the assumption that since she finds no evidence that he was out of London, therefore he must have been there [though he was a frequent traveler]. It would be a stronger case if she could get strong traction in handwriting expertise in the Ripper letters and Sickert's. She says that some experts conclude them identical but is awfully skimpy on the experts' names. She should mention the evidence against her own case. Take it head on.
The situation kinda reminds me of people that deal in reincarnation. They always claim they were someone famous in another life and never the common nobody. It's selling sensationalism, and that's this book. The two selling points about this book are the presented facts of the Ripper murders and letters [and not the baseless conjecture of Sickert's involvement]. The second selling point are that the chapters seem to end precisely when you have had enough of them. That kind of pace is refreshing actually. My advice, get it from the library [as I did], and skip the biographical chapters about Walter and his wife and family.
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