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(Mass Market Paperback - Reissue)
The truth behind the twisted crimes that inspired the films Psycho, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and The Silence of the Lambs...
From "America's principal chronicler of its greatest psychopathic killers" (The Boston Book Review) comes the definitive account of Ed Gein, a mild-mannered Wisconsin farmhand who stunned an unsuspecting nation and redefined the meaning of the word "psycho." The year was 1957. The place was an ordinary farmhouse in America's heartland, filled with extraordinary evidence of unthinkable depravity. The man behind the massacre was a slight, unassuming Midwesterner with a strange smile and even stranger attachment to his domineering mother. After her death and a failed attempt to dig up his mother's body from the local cemetery, Gein turned to other grave robberies and, ultimately, multiple murders. Driven to commit gruesome and bizarre acts beyond all imagining, Ed Gein remains one of the most deranged minds in the annals of American homicide. This is his story recounted in fascinating and chilling detail by Harold Schechter, one of the most acclaimed true-crime storytellers of our time.
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September 28, 2009: Ed Gein definitely goes down in history as one of our most unusual murderers. Schechter handles the story with skill in that he is honest about Mr. Gein's deeds, but he doesn't resort to simple labeling. Reader's can imagine (sort of) the pyschology behind the acts, even if we can't be exactly sympathetic. Great read for those who are interested true (sensational) crime. Gein had a motive for his acts, but probably not one that a sane person would have.