Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper -- Case Closed

Rating:
Summary: Innocent Until Proven Guilty....
Review: I love Patricia Cornwell's fiction books...and that's where I think her strength is...in fiction. Portrait of a Killer is an interesting account of her discoveries while investigating the 114 year old Jack the Ripper case. Cornwell asserts that the identity of Jack the Ripper is Walter Richard Sickert, case closed. I find this a bold pronouncement considering that Cornwell did not provide the reader with one definite shred of evidence that clearly and unequivocably pointed to Sickert as the Ripper. What she did do, was provide alot of circumstantial evidence that when put together does make an interesting but unproven case against Sickert. Cornwell boldly inserts her opinions as if they were facts when recreating the Victorian era and what might have happened on the streets. She makes conjectures about interactions between the victims and the Ripper, conjectures about what might have occured between Sickert and the people he interacted with and conjectures about what the police did and didn't do. The fact of the matter is, Cornwell has forgotton that a man is seldom convicted on circumstantial evidence and it is only conjecture and coincidence that Cornwell presents. Yes, Walter Sickert painted pictures of violence, yes he has stationary similiar to the one the Ripper notes were written on, yes he had operations in his childhood that may have rendered him impotent, and yes he was odd..but this all amounts to an educated guess. Is it fair to write a book based on an educated guess? In my opinion it's Jack the Ripper, case still unsolved.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating
Review: I could not put this book down once I started it. My skin crawled when I stared into the eyes of Sickert in the photos and read the accounts of his childhood medical experiences. Whether or not you believe the theories, this book gives a disturbing and memorable account of life in London the late 1800s. Ms. Cornwell obviously did extensive research into the various 'Ripper' theories and compiled a thrilling book which keeps the reader turning the pages and jumping at every noise. I read a library edition of this text and was so enthralled that I purchased a copy for my personal library.

Rating:
Summary: Great topic - bad science
Review: As a Molecular Geneticist myself, I was very interested in reading this book when I heard about the DNA evidence that was included. What an incredible disappointment! I have never seen such an example of science done badly. What little evidence that is presented (very disjointedly I might add) is drowned by the plethora of assumption and stretching of the data. There were many times I wanted to bring out my red pen to correct the atrocities in this book. I honestly do not know Patricia Cornwall's credentials beyond that she worked for a coroner (but in what capacity? It seems she must done secretarial or janitorial work to have this little knowledge of the topic). Her reasoning is extremely hard to follow, maybe because she is holding it together with such tenuous threads. I guess I would sum up this book in one word -- "aggravating." Please don't present yourself and your work as "Case Closed" when your case is not based enough on true scientific evidence and method to even bring the case to court.

Rating:
Summary: Jack the Ripper - ONE woman's theories
Review: This book was suggested to me by a friend who is a fan of Patricia Cornwell. Realizing that I am a fan of true crime, she thought I would enjoy this book. While I finish every book I read, I could not bring myself to finish this book. I thought it was terrible.

First off, Cornwell uses the word maybe so liberally that its usage in itself challenges her credibilty. At times, she seems to be throwing theories around as if she is throwing spaghetti against the wall to see if it will stick. Cornwell spends nearly 15 pages describing the potential abnormailities of her suspect's penis. She spends pages throwing around these possibilties. This is not the type of reading I want to unwind to in the evening. All of her theories are based on circumstancial evidence. Realistically, a mildly compelling case can be made for almost anybody living in London during this time. The identity of Jack the Ripper will probably never be known. In this book, Patricia Cornwell has written some amateur caliber fiction, but she certainly has not brought us any closer to knowing Jack the Ripper's identity.

Rating:
Summary: Slow read
Review: I found this to be a hard read. The author jumped all over the place and made it hard to follow. I don't think she made a good case against the "Ripper" no matter how hard she tried to tie unrelated facts together. Most of it was speculative at best with little or no hard evidence.

Rating:
Summary: Huge Disappointment
Review: This book is garbage. Cornwell labels Strickert,who is obviously dead and not able to defend himself, a serial killer. She ought to be ashamed of herself. Cornwell's book is called "case closed." What a joke. You could never get a conviction in court on the evidence she presents. Furthermore, she's a boring writer. ...

Rating:
Summary: Please stop and think before you criticise
Review: Cornwell proves beyond a reasonable doubt that Walter Sickert was obsessed with the Ripper case and wrote numerous letters claiming to BE Jack the Ripper. Letters written by Sickert and the self-described Ripper did not merely share watermarks - they came from the same batch of 24 sheets, and their stamps and flaps share DNA! If this letter-writer was a prankster, how did he manage to predict far-off locations and details of near-future crimes? Cornwell had no desire to frame Sickert; a couple of years ago she knew virtually nothing about either Sickert or the Ripper. Cornwell has won over the world's foremost Sickert expert. The head of Scotland Yard says that he would arrest Sickert on Cornwell's evidence. But no, all these amateurs know better! The hysterical reaction to Cornwell's well-proven case reminds me of the reaction to Fawn Brodie's assertion that Thomas Jefferson had children by Sally Hemings. Everyone attacked her. It's just sexism and a refusal to let go of preconceived notions. Eventually, Cornwell's will be the received opinion. The truth is the daughter of time. The book, by the way, is riveting.

Rating:
Summary: The Most Slated Book in The History of Modern Literature
Review: Nowhere in recent memory has a book been panned so much as Patricia Cornwell's Jack the Ripper. In fact it will probably go down in history as the most read wacky attempt at complete and utter mind-shattering skullduggery ever committed to the page. Not only has Cornwell just invented a new GENRE (Crime Faction) she has shocked art appreciators worldwide (she destroyed a Sickert paining in her research and yet she now claims to be a leading Sickert expert because she has spent time on a tiny fragment of the artist's huge volume of work) and probably done nothing more than zip a population back to the old days of the White Chapel murder myths. Now there is nothing wrong with Cornwell coming up with her own theory, Hundreds of writers have done it, so why does Cornwell get singled out? In fact Stephen Knight's 1976 book, Jack the Ripper: The Final Solution and Jean Overton Fuller's 1990 book, Sickert & The Ripper Crimes, both allude to Walter Sickert, the painter, as being Jack the Ripper. The answer lies in the numerous ways that her theory is presented, what she had done to get there and more importantly - how she treats the reader by pressing them with statements every other paragraph that read "Can't you see, he is Jack the Ripper!"

First of all, one must look at the development of Ripper suspects. Between the years of 1888 and 1993 it was an absolute FREE FOR ALL. No one had done a thorough modern investigation into the case and so many myths where exploited by anyone who cared to do so. That is until 1994 when Philip Sugden wrote - "The Complete History of Jack the Ripper". Sugden's work is highly held in the greatest esteem because it did the following. (1) Sugden meticulously researched everything from the ground up and included a full bibliography with references to police files that could be accessed by the public. (2) He kept everything factual, real and did not deviate into speculation and theory. Sugden's work is the reason why books written by Ripper charlatans came to an end and only a handful of new works have since emerged. Cornwell must have missed out on Sugden somewhere. Now if you are a new Ripperologist who is just starting out in the field then maybe you could be forgiven for not getting up to date with Sugden's revision of the entire case - but if you are a Ripper writer, and you have not yet covered Sugden, well not a lot is going to be said for you unless you repeated his type of research from start to finish.

I am not going to list all the problems with her theory - based on a Ripper letter that was never seriously considered to be ripper letter in the first place, even though the investigators at the time believed the letters to be a hoax, all 200 + of them, that have passed through many hands, for over 100 years, that she extracts DNA from, but only uses a mtDNA test that limits the DNA owner to 10% of the population! - nor will I go into the fact that she never proves Sickert was in London at the time of the killings, when there is evidence to suggest that he was in France, and killed prostitutes because he had a deformed penis and could not perform, even though he has heirs that exist today, and no evidence has ever been found that his penis was deformed - nor will I go into the little artifacts of his phrases and scribbles that match up with some alleged Ripper memorabilia, that seem more like chance occurrences or that fact that this is just an attempt to frame a suspect well before any research was undertaken. No I won't - What I really want to address in this review is the problem of a failed expensive investigations in that is need of a copout.

What has happened here is that Cornwell did not bite the bullet. Ripperologists have always been intrigued about DNA testing and the Ripper case. Cornwell has proven that DNA can be extracted from Ripper artifacts that are over 100 years old. This is unique!.... but costs a bomb to do. Now if Cornwell had written a book about that then maybe she would have saved face, but certainly not her money. In many ways this is a very sad book for Cornwell. I see it more of a study of a writer who can not face the reality of what is obviously a very expensive expedition to prove that DNA can be lifted from Ripper artifacts. It is obvious that the writer and publisher are probably in a desperate bid to try and redeem the costs of what is probably THE MOST EXPENSIVE BOOK EVER WRITTEN. Come on? Do you really believe that Cornwell, a big name crime fiction writer, has solved the biggest crime mystery of our time?!!! She hyped this project to no end. She hyped it for well over a year. She spent millions of her own money behind the marketing campaign and evidence gathering. All the eggs where in the basket before the book was written. It was either a book about "I found DNA on Ripper merchandise" or a book about "I found DNA on Ripper merchandise... and discovered the Killer - Case Closed." I seriously doubt that Cornwell believes that Sickert is Jack the Ripper. If this book did that then the Editor would have not tried so hard to make this book so disjointed and presented in such a disorganized manner. This is not a book about Jack the Ripper. It is not even a book about Water Sickert. It is a book about the world of HIGH CONCEPT publishing, EXPENSIVE research, FAILED product delivery and trying to SAVE a reputation.

And for that reason alone it is an absolute MUST READ!!!!

...

Rating:
Summary: If she said so ...
Review: I just don't believe what I read in this book, first of all let me tell you that this book could be written in 50 pages, all the stories around the main story are boring and boring, and she compares what would happened if Jack the Ripper were alive in these days, how would you know that? When you write a story that really happened you don't compare what would happened if that story would be in our days.
I wrote a book of the story of Cleopatra and I wrote my novel in the Antarctica, but I never made any comparison if Cleopatra were alive today, you just can't do that.
I put 2 stars to this book because I just can't put one star to a book.
But at the end you really think that Patricia Cornwell knows who was Jack the Ripper?

Rating:
Summary: Mmmm, I don't think the case is closed
Review: I've always had people tell me I needed to read some Patricia Cornwell. I've always been interested in Jack the Ripper so I thought I'd check this book out and see what she was all about. Apparently she's all about being self-indulgent and writing too many chapters which are basically her restating her already shaky evidence. This Sickert guy is an interesting guy to read about and, hell, he might actually be the guy, but it will take a whole lot more than the circumstantial and non-evidence Cornwell provides in this book. Going by what she writes, the only thing I'm positive about concerning Sickert is that he was a snooty guy who didn't treat his wife too fondly. Cornwell gets way too wordy and the book is just really repetitive as a lot of the same things get repeated over and over. Plus, she constantly reminds us about the handicaps that the police at the time were dealing with, but I'm sure they were not so inept that they didn't look at things like the watermark she is so fond of talking about. Check it out if you're a Cornwell fan or a Jack the Ripper nerd, but just don't expect too much.