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Savage Appetites: Four True Stories of Women, Crime, and Obsession Audiobook
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A provocative and original investigation of our cultural fascination with crime, linking four archetypes—Detective, Victim, Defender, Killer—to four true stories about women driven by obsession.
In this illuminating exploration of women, violence, and obsession, Rachel Monroe interrogates the appeal of true crime through four narratives of fixation. In the 1940s, a frustrated heiress began creating dollhouse crime scenes depicting murders, suicides, and accidental deaths. Known as the “Mother of Forensic Science,” she revolutionized the field of what was then called legal medicine. In the aftermath of the Manson Family murders, a young woman moved into Sharon Tate’s guesthouse and, over the next two decades, entwined herself with the Tate family. In the mid-nineties, a landscape architect in Brooklyn fell in love with a convicted murderer, the supposed ringleader of the West Memphis Three, through an intense series of letters. After they married, she devoted her life to getting him freed from death row. And in 2015, a teenager deeply involved in the online fandom for the Columbine killers planned a mass shooting of her own.
Each woman, Monroe argues, represents and identifies with a particular archetype that provides an entryway into true crime. Through these four cases, she traces the history of American crime through the growth of forensic science, the evolving role of victims, the Satanic Panic, the rise of online detectives, and the long shadow of the Columbine shooting. In a combination of personal narrative, reportage, and a sociological examination of violence and media in the twentieth and twenty-first century, Savage Appetites scrupulously explores empathy, justice, and the persistent appeal of violence.
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“She zooms in on characters who fall into those familiar narrative tropes. In doing so, she sketches an unconventional history of some of the twenty-first century’s most notable and horrific crimes.”
— The Nation
Quotes
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“Enthralling…Monroe zeroes in on the aftermath of murder, on the morbid curiosity that draws eager civilians toward the crime scene and catapults them into starring roles.”
— New York Times Book Review -
“Monroe explores how a vicarious interest in violent crime transformed the lives of four women—and how our collective interest in such crimes has shaped American culture.”
— Boston Globe -
“A new, necessary, and brilliant book.”
— NPR -
“An engrossing look at a counterintuitive yet well-established phenomenon.”
— Publisher Weekly
Awards
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A New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice
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Esquire pick of the Best Books of Summer
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A BuzzFeed Books Pick of Amazing Books Coming Out This Summer
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A Literary Hub Pick of Most Anticipated Books of 2019
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About Rachel Monroe
Rachel Monroe is currently a writer and volunteer firefighter living in Marfa, Texas. She’s written about #vanlife for the New Yorker; a romantic con man for the Atlantic, pick-up artists for New York magazine; child abductions on the Navajo Nation for Esquire; and a small-town quilting scandal for Texas Monthly. Her work has appeared in The Best American Travel Writing 2018, the New York Times, the New York Times Magazine, the Guardian, the Believer, and elsewhere. She is the author of Savage Appetites.
About Jayme Mattler
Julia Whelan is a novelist, screenwriter, lifelong actor, and multiple award-winning audiobook narrator. She graduated with a degree in English and creative writing from Middlebury College and Oxford University. She is a former child actor who has appeared in multiple films and television shows.