Rating: 
Summary: Shameful and Farcical!
Review: ln its critique of this book, the NY Times pointed out that the author violated every principle of valid research in her
simplistic endeavor to "prove" her absurd theory. Shockingly, the reviewer also detailed the many, many inaccuracies in this book, including the "stating of possibilities as facts, based on nothing but her intuition". The reviewer proves that Ms. Cornwall's book is both sloppy and insulting.Ahh, wouldst the publisher have been as thorough in its research! Did they just simply accept the book as irrevocable truth? Shame on them!
Rating:
Summary: The Worst Book Ever Written - Case Closed
Review: I've had an interest in Jack the Ripper for the last couple of years, and when I found out that Ms. Cornwell was going to be investing such a massive amount of money and "scientific study" into determining who the killer was, I was ecstatic. What a great idea for a fiction writer to do right? Unfortunately, I was caught up in the tremendous amount of hype that surrounded this book and failed to see the glaringly obvious flaw: this was a FICTION writer. This fact becomes painfully clear on the first page of the book. "Portrait of a Killer" would make for a somewhat decent work of fiction. It would make for a mediocre "historical" fiction novel based on a real event. As a "non-fiction novel, it is absolutely horrible, and definitely the worst non-fiction book I have ever read. I've never read a Cornwell novel before, but it seems that she is trying to use real people to create fictitious characters. Walter Sickert is the man she is convinced held the secret identity of Jack the Ripper. Cornwell's entire premise for this book is that she would be using the scientific method, and more interestingly, DNA analysis, something that has never been done on the Ripper case. When her DNA analysis and scientific studies fail, she STILL uses the unconvincing results to try to draw definitive conclusions that Sickert was the killer. The DNA "evidence" that is Cornwell's main link to Sickert and the Ripper, is actually mitochondrial DNA, or mtDNA. This type of DNA is actually very common, and is shared by anywhere from 1-10% of the population. Furthermore, Cornwell cannot even state with certainty that the DNA she tested was even Sickert's. How does she explain away all of the eyewitness alibis Sickert had for 4 or the 5 murders, placing Sickert in Paris at the time? She doesn't, she simply ignores them. Her ENTIRE book is based on a wide amount of circumstantial evidence that doesn't even come close to being "scientific." Most of the letters she attributes to the Ripper have been widely recognized as hoaxes by the Ripper community. From reading her book, one would think that Cornwell had some sort of personal vendetta against Sickert, as she attempts to portray him as an insane psychopath. What does she use to support this claim? Mainly Sickert's sickening tendencies to take walks at night or paint! Cornwell failed mmiserable with "Portrait of a Killer." She attempted to spend 1 year stepping into a completely unknown field. A field that has been explored by people studying the Ripper and the evidence for decades. Her only advantage over other authors on Ripper books was her budget and access to Ripper documents and testing laboratories. However, when this fails to turn up a single bit of conclusive evidence that Sickert could even possibly be the killer, Cornwell loses her ground and proceeds to recede back to what she does best: writing fiction. Even if her evidence proved without a doubt that Sickert was the killer, the book is so horribly written and jumps around so much, there is no way I would ever recommend it to anyone else.
Rating: 
Summary: A Fabulous Book
Review: As a university professor who teaches required classes for history majors on methods of inquiry and analysis, I am constantly on the lookout for books that utilize specific methodologies and present original theses. Since many of my students will never teach or go to graduate school, I like to suggest the kinds of careers that they might seek with a history degree--investigative reporting is one of them. I have a particular interest in Victorian Society because my great-great-grandmother may have been stalked in Whitechapel by the Ripper on her way home from work as a domestic servant. Although I am not a "Ripperologist," I have spent time in my classes dealing with themes of poverty, prostitution and violence against women in 19th century England, subjects that Corwell discusses with sensitive accuracy.
My assessment of this book is that it represents an outstanding and reasoned attempt to prove what a number of historians have suspected for some time but have lacked the scientific evidence to prove: that Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper. To do this, Cornwell, a forensic scientist as well as a mystery writer, utilizes her own expertise and that of others to analyse medical information, DNA evidence, handwriting, police reports, diaries, letters, railroad schedules, ink, paint, stationary production and distribution, finger prints and art. At every point, she anticipated objections to her arguments and her conclusions and met them head on. I found the latter to be very nearly convincing and her sources to be impeccable and I challenge anyone to do a better job or to produce a compelling counter thesis.
Rating:
Summary: This book IS NOT speculation!
Review: Portrait Of A Killer is not a book about Particia Cornwell or her writting abilities. This book chronicles the real life forensic findings that Walter Sickert was, in fact, Jack The Ripper regardless of how well or poorly this book was written. As far as the flow of the book is concerned, any rational, unbiased mind can follow it. Patricia lays out all the pertinent background facts and information before expanding on each of the murders; in order to help the reader to see why certain key clues are relevant and how they relate to the lives of Sickert and his victims before and after the murders.
Where a reader sets him or herself up to fail is in the attitude in which they approach this book, material, evidence. If the reader has read the graphic novel "From Hell" (by Alan Moore and Edie Campbell), or seen the film of the same name and similar basic principle, he or she may be more inclined to be too swept away by the romantic notions that they suggest and not be able to appreciate the time, effort, and intuitive fortitude that went into this new work on an old mystery. This is unfortunate. What evidence more than expert handwriting analysis, artistic technique evaluation, and a very apparent motive will suffice for these skeptics would undoubtedly be the excavation of Sickert's parent's graves for further DNA testing.
Rating: 
Summary: Scott Cassidy's Good Ol' Review
Review: The great detail involved in Patricia Cornwell's Portrait of a Killer makes it a worthwhile book to read. The facts were all there to believe entirely that Walter Sickert, the supposed "Jack," murdered these 19th century English prostitutes. However, the book doesn't allow much room for making an educated guess on who the murderer is. The book is somewhat biased in that sense, but the author was able to back up any assumptions with clear, logical evidence. The book is an enticing, titillating thriller, but unlike other murder mystery stories, this one is entirely fact, thus increasing the excitement of the reading process. The gruesome pictures of the four dead women, as well as Sickert and his family, could make a statue bend over in queasiness. The detail of the women's sufferings are graphic, but to a point that makes you feel for them but not pity them. It is a great book and especially good for fans of notorious murderers and the crimes they committed.
Rating:
Summary: Portrait of an author's ego
Review: To quote the author herself, "It is sad that men whose lives and careers were touched by the Ripper cases would spin theories almost as baseless as some of those offered by people who weren't even born at the time of the crimes." Patricia Cornwell case is as baseless as those she criticizes. It offers little more than an ego trip, with occasional salacious details, often unrelated, to keep the average reader titillated. She offers little of substance to prove her case. Rather, she starts with an assumption, not even original to her, and warps facts to fit her hypothesis. And the book is not even well written. It is poorly organzed and jumpy.
Rating:
Summary: Where's the Science?
Review: Apologies to all you Patricia Cornwell fans, but I find this to be the worst book to have been written on Jack the Ripper - and the book's subject aside, from a structural point of view, it is a badly written book by any standards. Bearing in mind her background and vast forensic experience, I do not know how Ms Cornwell can justify claiming to have solved a hitherto unsolved case when she puts forward absolutely no evidence beyond her own suppostions, which are based on considerable experience admittedly but which remain shakily founded suppositions, none the less. Add to this that Ms Cornwell is, anyway, not the first person to have connected Sickert to the Ripper killings. I am not, at the best of times, a Patricia Cornwell fan but I bought and read this book with an open mind, believing that she might, indeed, have finally solved the Ripper murders. The book was an enormous disappointment and has certainly not persuaded me to reconsider her offerings in crime fiction.
Rating: 
Summary: interesting but tedious
Review: Patricia Cornwell does a good job presenting the evidence against Sickert, the man she believes is Jack the Ripper. However, it was very hard to get through this book. She builds a convincing case, but the text itself is very dry. I felt at times like I was reading a textbook. It will pick up at certain parts and before you know it, you have read 2 or 3 chapters. Then it will take a week to get through the next chapter. I felt myself reading lines over and over again because it completely lost my interest. I was stuck on page 170 for days. I think she could have summarized more in areas such as the chapter on the letters and the types of paper used. Overall, I think she does a great job in portraying the evidence in many different aspects of a criminal case, (motif, opportunity, letter/writing profiles, personality traits, the inner workings of the psychopathic mind, etc.) although I think it would have been much more interesting and enjoyable to read had she wrote it in the form of a crime novel from the perspective of Dr. Kay Scarpetta, as was her original intention. The book does however, leave you knowing more than ever about the life and times of Jack the Ripper and how it was to live in London during that depressing time in the history of England.
Rating:
Summary: CASE CLOSED?
Review: Patricia Cornwell's highly publicized and rather controversial look at the infamous Jack the Ripper killings is an interesting book into which the author has obviously poured countless hours of hard, painstaking research and leg work, and that, combined with the writer's evident sense of justice, is to be much praised and admired. As a thoughtful examination of one possible angle on the Ripper murders the book largely succeeds; as the airtight posthumous indictment it is supposed to be, however, it comes up short. Cornwell makes several highly questionable decisions in making her case. She relies heavily on some rather tenuous DNA from the time of the killings, evidence which in this scenario is far too thin for the emphasis the author attempts to hang on it. Her analysis of the suspect's psychological makeup and actions during the period in question are composed largely of speculation and guesswork, devoid of the kind of hard evidence I had hoped to discover. Cornwell's confidence in the numerous "Ripper Letters" the police received at the time is hard to swallow, and requires some highly unlikely--though admittedly not impossible--legerdemain on the part of her suspect. Most disturbing is that Cornwell seems to have chosen this suspect very quickly after looking at the Ripper case file, and one has the feeling she has then simply rearranged much of the available information to suit her own presupposition. That her suspect was at least eccentric and may have had some glaring personal deficiencies is hardly debatable, but that does not automatically make him a serial killer. As a literary work Cornwell's book suffers from a pair of serious drawbacks. First, the arrogance with which she approaches the case is nearly embarrassing. She shows no respect whatsoever for others who have published theories on the infamous Whitechapel slayings, and very little for the police who actually worked on the case at the time. Cornwell's apparent disdain for those who have gone before her is annoying and frequently distracting. Second, the book is badly organized and heavily padded, as the author jumps from one train of thought to the next in no recognizable pattern so as to frequently leave the reader backpedaling to try to catch up, a problem exacerbated by the fact that the book is about a hundred pages too long. Many of Cornwell's personal commentaries and historical notes are repeated over and over to no obvious purpose. A tighter, more pointed text would have benefitted the author's case immensely. Despite its glaring weaknesses, "Portrait of a Killer" is a commendable book in many respects. I would certainly recommend it to Ripper buffs, students of Victorian England, or mystery fans in general. If the author's evidence is not irrefutable, it is at least thought-provoking, and evidently Ms. Cornwell continues to follow up on some of the evidence as we speak, so perhaps an updated edition will tie up some of the loose ends. Maybe she's even right. Time will perhaps tell. But as of right now "Portrait of a Killer," though admirable, hardly lives up to its subtitle. A thoughtful, well-researched re-examination of the most infamous serial killer of all time? Certainly. But case closed? *No.*
Rating: 
Summary: Speculation on top of Speculation
Review: I'm not saying much that the other 450 or so reviews already here haven't said; more just adding my thumb to the scale of those disappointed by how dramatically short Ms. Cornwell's "case" comes to being "closed." Perhaps my biggest problem with the book has nothing to do with the soundness of the theory, but instead with how poorly written it is. It is in serious need of an a competent editor. Chapters start with lofty premises that never pan out, or, worse, are never tied to anything concrete. The meandering narrative weaves between things presented as fact to things that, eventually, one learns are sheer speculation, with little warning of the transition. You will find yourself frequently wondering, "how does this relate to anything I've read previously," and then later, "how did that relate to anything that came later in the chapter." It's really bad. Actually, as I think about it, my hunch is that this is all deliberate and that Cornwell would like anything but a competent editor -- some of the "evidence" on which she has "closed" the "case" is so sketchy (see below) that obsfuscation really is her friend. Clarity would probably reveal a lot that she doesn't want revealed. Equally troubling is how unconvincing Ms. Cornwell is. It's certainly an interesting theory. But much of the book is simply conjecture piled on top of speculation, as Cornwell attempts lamely to convince you of what she has apparently already convinced herself. Some of it is so absurd that I quite literally laughed out loud. One theory that repeats itself randomly thoughout the book is that that Walter Sickert is the Ripper, because some Ripper letters use the at-the-time rare expression "ha ha ha," which, Cornwell assures us, is an American affectation, and one that Sickert probably would have heard because he hung around as an apprentice to an American, and that American, Cornwell believes, had a good sense of humor, so therefore probably liked practical jokes, and thus, quite naturally, surely laughed at times, and when he did certainly did so by using "ha ha." Really. That's a central theory to the book. I'm not making this up. The genital mutilation theory, on which the book puts much emphasis, is equally sketchy -- one waits patiently through 400 pages to learn what evidentiary basis she has for the theory, but it's really just pop-psychology, 120 years after the fact. Which is not to say that the entire book is all conjecture. I think Cornwell does an admirable job of making a case that Sickert wrote some Ripper letters. If she had limited herself to that modest, but startling, premise, and then asked the next natural questions, the book would be quite valuable. But that is hardly enough to put "case closed" on the cover, which of course is not going to sell many books. And that, fundamentally, is my problem with the book. Cornwell gets trapped, because she doesn't want to admit that the next natural question -- did the writer of Ripper lettes have special knowledge that demonstrates he was acutally the killer and not just some twisted prankster -- has no answer. Instead, she glosses over it, by use of slight of hand, and about how images in the Ripper letters are similer to coroner's photographs and those photographs show the body as only the killer could have seen it. It's pretty shallow. Anyway, you get the point. My last point is only a quibble, but it really was unnecessary and completely annoying. Throughout the book, Cornwell writes how she would have analyzed the crime scenes, if the murders happened today, and all the wonderful evidence that she, super slueth, would have preserved. These passages really must be read to appreciate their self-congratulatory and pedantic nature. It's extreme. The true value of this book, if it exists, and the reason I give it two stars instead of one, is the portraits it paints of the victims, who have been forgotten as the legend, if that's the right word, of the Ripper has grown. Cornwell is not the first to do this, by any means, but she handles the victims with dignity and with honor, which is, in my view, this psuedo-novel's chief redeeming feature.
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