Book Review: Inside the Mind of BTK | John Douglas

Time: 7:00P.M. CST

Temp: 6 F tonight low of 6 below zero

Weather: Cold

Location: On my bouncy bed being bounced all over by my daughter Skye, in my bed room, Olathe, Ks

This is the 008 Day of 2010

"Inside the Mind of BTK" by John Douglas Review

Title: Inside the Mind of BTK: The True Story Behind the Thirty-Year Hunt for the Notorious WichitaSerial Killer
By: John Douglas and Johnny Dodd
Obtained: http://www.audible.com
Type: Unabridged Audio
Read by: Jason Klav

Reading Time: 12 Hours 40 Minutes

Publisher’s Summary:

This incredible story shows how John Douglas tracked and participated in the hunt for one of the most notorious serial killers in U.S. history. For 31 years, a man who called himself BTK (Bind, Torture, Kill) terrorized the city of Wichita, Kansas, sexually assaulting and strangling a series of women, taunting the police with frequent communications, and bragging about his crimes to local newspapers and TV stations.

After disappearing for nine years, he suddenly reappeared, complaining that no one was paying enough attention to him and claiming that he had committed other crimes for which he had not been given credit. When he was ultimately captured, BTK was shockingly revealed to be Dennis Rader, a 61-year-old married man with two children.

My Thoughts:
Pros: I’ve read books by John Douglas for several years now about several different people. I like how he doesn’t make the crimes he covers seem attractive and glorious, rather he tells it like it is. and hopefully by reading the stories of the people in his books the reader will learn how not to get tangled up with people like BTK, John Robinson etc.
He doesn’t make the cimes look romantic as some writers do just to catch a buck. He really does care for the victims and doesn’t get snowed by the slick crooks and killers who think they can fool everyone.

Cons: The man who reads this book doesn’t pronounce some words propersly. Most notibly the name of the place the FBI is located. It is said like "Quon-tick-O" stress on the "Quon" bit of the name, or that is how I’ve always heard it pronounced by NLS and other readers. This man says it like "Quon-Tee-Co" with a long E sound in the central and stressed part of the name. Typically he says Arkansas as in the state, river and not how we locals in Wichita say it, the Are Kansas. and most perplexingly, he says raise, as in when one rases a house, tears it down as raz as in when you razz somebody. Rather irratating.

About the Book:

I grew up in the 1980s in Wichita. I remember hearing abot the GhostBusters taskforce and the murder in 1986. My parents tried to sheild me from most of the news coverage as I remember but you can’t help bu hear some things. I knew BTK meant a bad man…

As I got older and started reading true crime my friend Brina and I would read over the phone some of the BTK books that were out there, she’d come call me and read bits down the phone… Then in 2005 when they cought him I was in Denver and I remember the day as clear as a bell. I also followed the court proseedings in August of that year and read more books about BTK.

I finally understood what and why my parents sheilded me from that monster. Then I found out a thing that brought the whole BTK thing too close to home… My dad was involced with Boy Scouts and my mom and sister and brother, of corse. Come to find out that BTK went to some of the same meetings my mom and dad went to and my folks actually talked to BTK only of corse at the time they didn’t know… They have both said that the BTK was creep and they didn’t think highly of him.

This is one of the better books I’ve read. Parts are a bit graphic but as I said earlier there is no romantic ideas of this BTK. No glitz no glamor. It is a graphic ugly subject. There were some thing I either overlooked or didn’t know that were presented in this book. If you are not up for a grooling tough gut ripping read, don’t read this or don’t read it straight through. I found myself feeling overwhelmed and feeling like ai just slogged through a evil swamp and had to cleans my mind with a happy, lighter reading, review coming soon…

Ratings:
Narration: 4 out of 5
Writing: 5 out of 5
Over All: 4 out of 5