<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: Betty was not off her Rocker
Review: Betty Broderick knew exactly what she was doing. This book just helps perpetuate her con. The author propagates Betty Broderick like a poster child for all vindictive spouses who whish to murder their partners. Martyrdom status and all that implies for Betty! No way I say!
Rating: 
Summary: Two Way Street
Review: I have seen and continue to see this type of behavior in marriages emanating from either spouse. I am not referring to the act of consummate violence such as this book chronicles but to circumstances that can lead up to it. They are happily married, have children, live comfortably and one day it is all over. It may be the husband or the wife but one spouse decides that it is time for a change. One spouse may be cheating or not. It really doesn't matter. It turns the world upside-down. What brings a person to make such a traumatic decision? I do not believe that any one person knows for sure. Who knows what goes on inside a household or behind closed bedroom doors? In a relationship does any one person know what is going on in the mind of the other? What it all comes down to is impressions. These impressions can be based on reality or imagination. It is all a matter of how well a person interprets the facts and what those facts mean to that person. It's sort of like a psychiatrist with a patient who comes in with an emergency. A broken nail can be an emergency to some patients. Author Stumbo is obviously biased to Betty's unique denouement to a relationship that Betty has envisioned through some delusion of reality. It seemed like Betty really needed this relationship and the children for her own stability. I believe she thrived and survived on a role of self-imposed pity because it filled some void in her psyche. This books made me wonder about the meaning of love. I don't believe that Betty really loved her children or her husband. She just went through the motions because she needed that void filled in her life. There were obviously things that Dan needed in his life. Dan was a smart guy. I think he eventually saw the physiological makeup of his wife. She was sick and she needed help. How many people in a relationship really understand when their partner needs professional help? Not many do. I think Dan just took the quickest and easiest and most accessible out there was - Linda Kolkena. Unfortunately it is the children that suffer the most. However, my main contention about this book is that Linda Kolkena was just as much a human being as Betty Broderick is. Dan Broderick was just as much a human being as Betty Broderick is. They both had a right to live their own lives. Now Linda and Dan are dead. Betty never manifested any symptoms of psychosis. If a person is truly psychotic I do not believe they are responsible for their actions. That's my personal belief. Betty knew perfectly well what she was doing. There are tens of thousands of male and female Betty Brodericks out there. My advice to this author is to go hang out in some singles bars from which you will hear horror story upon horror story. Like Tarzan said to Jane: It's a real jungle out there. People fall every day but they pick themselves up and grab hold of the next vine. And come to think of it Tarzan never did like guns in his jungle.
Rating: 
Summary: Book buys into the myth
Review: The book is well written and researched, but unfortunately buys into Betty's defense. Everyone who thinks Betty is a martyr, wake up! She is a textbook example of someone with Borderline Personality Disorder. That is why she bonded with Dan and became the perfect mother - in her mind, she had no identity till she met him and gained an identity as wife and mother. Dan may not have been a nice person or a good husband. However, on the flip side, he had no chance of living up to the expectations of a spouse with BPD. Of course, we'll never hear his side of the story. This woman was abusive and violent even before the murders and used her children as tools against her ex-husband. It's disturbing that she is a symbol for women who really are used and thrown away by their ex-husbands.
Rating: 
Summary: quite a bit different from the movie
Review: While I in no way defend what Betty did, the movie version had Dan and Linda as angels just picked on by Betty. In the book, it showed the way Dan really manipulated the system and got what he wanted. They knew she was crazy but I don't think she would have went over the deep end as much if Linda hadn't took over her house, kids, even the Notre Dame games, just stepped into her shoes. You see it all the time, women work so he can go to school, give up their career and when men go through their "menopause" they want a younger woman along with their corvette. This is definitely a tragedy and I just wonder now how the kids lives turned out.
Rating:
Summary: quite a bit different from the movie
Review: While I in no way defend what Betty did, the movie version had Dan and Linda as angels just picked on by Betty. In the book, it showed the way Dan really manipulated the system and got what he wanted. They knew she was crazy but I don't think she would have went over the deep end as much if Linda hadn't took over her house, kids, even the Notre Dame games, just stepped into her shoes. You see it all the time, women work so he can go to school, give up their career and when men go through their "menopause" they want a younger woman along with their corvette. This is definitely a tragedy and I just wonder now how the kids lives turned out.
<< 1 >>
| 
