Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Very detailed account of the Yorkshire Ripper case, so detailed it is not for the squeamish. I can remember as a pre-teen & teenager following this case as it was all happening and even living on another continent being terrified after hearing of each murder. I also remember relief when Peter Sutcliffe was caught. Still very sad for all the victims families especially learning from Chris Cook’s book how botched the police investigation was conducted at the time. A very good true crime look, with a part two coming. Highly recommend!

NetGalley, Janet Watkins

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

I have read several books on serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, who was also known as the Yorkshire Ripper, and this one is by far the most thorough and interesting. It starts with Peter's childhood and family life as well as his teen-age years. The attacks and/or murders of the 32 women victims in this book are thoroughly researched and described. If the police investigations would not have been no shoddy, the cases would have been solved a lot sooner and with less victims. I think the author did a fantastic job presenting all the facts of these cases in written form.

NetGalley, Lee Husemann

A great true crime story that everyone needs to read. It is written great and really gets to the root of the case.

NetGalley, Michelle Griffiths

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Peter Sutcliffe, The Yorkshire Ripper, is arguably Britain’s worst serial killer. Holding the women of Yorkshire and much of Lancaster in a state of terror for the latter half of the seventies his moniker, if not his identity, was known to all. More than four decades after he was imprisoned it is a rare person who hasn't heard of his name and the crimes that he has committed. But for such an infamous case how much do people really know? How much horror was swept under the carpet because the public was ‘at its limit’?

I pride myself on my reviews being spoiler-free. As this is a true crime book much of the content is known already. For that reason, commonly known facts may be discussed below but major ‘spoilers’ will be avoided. If you have no idea who Peter Sutcliffe was or what he did then don’t read any further and just go and read the book!

Before reading this book I felt that I had quite a deep knowledge of the Ripper case. I grew up a short distance away from where he was arrested. My mother was friends with the cousin of one of the Ripper’s younger victims and the parent of a close friend of mine worked in the police force on the case. I didn’t think that there was much that I would learn from the book so read it out of interest alone. I couldn’t have been more wrong…

Chris Cook starts the coverage of the book chronicling the early life of Sutcliffe. The conditions he grew up in and details about his family. It covers Sutcliffe’s courtship and the difficulties the young couple faced. The picture painted makes it much easier to see why none of his immediate family suspected anything was amiss.

Then the meat of the case. Cook covers every attack from the Ripper’s first known. The details cover the lives of the victims, humanising them in ways the press failed to do at the time. The details of the attacks are vivid and comprehensive. Descriptions of the crime scenes feel like they come straight from the police report. I was impressed with the depth of the information but this book goes so much deeper.

Several further attacks, not attributed to the Yorkshire Ripper are also discussed. Many of these have too many similarities, or survivors able to identify Sutcliffe, that it is astounding how these were never connected by the Police. Although that arguably is also covered in the book.

West Yorkshire police had on their hands the UK’s largest murder investigation. Hampered by a lack of technology and so much paperwork that they actually had to strengthen the floor of the Police station that they were working out of, it is understandable that things may have gotten missed. This book highlights the issues brought up in the damning 1982 Byford Report and in West Yorkshires Police’s own 1983 ‘Report into the Investigation of the Series of Murders and Assaults on Women in the North of England between 1975 and 1980’. Seeing the callous way the Police treated many victims and the number of times that Ripper should have been caught but wasn’t makes you realise that Sutcliffe’s actions aren’t the only horror in this tragically too-real story.

This book is the perfect blend of facts and heartbreak. From the crime scenes to the famous soap actor who became involved in the case, every page is packed with information that draws you into a case that will never be forgotten. I, for one, couldn’t put it down!

NetGalley, Lisa LeDuc

Cook keeps the emphasis on the victims. Each victim has a biography, and the reader is reminded of what is lost by the woman’s murder or even attack. It isn’t trauma porn, or at least it doesn’t come across as such, but it is about loss and the respect that should be given to the victims, including their families. In order to do this, each woman gets her own chapter, which means the reader is getting accounts of the attacks. So hard going in terms of violence but important because it places the victims front and center. I’m glad the book is structured this way.
The style is basically reporting and not sensationalized and, as I said, Cook keeps the focus on the victims and how the investigation in many ways let them down. The reporting tone actually does make those parts hit harder.
You do learn much about the case from the book.

NetGalley, Christine Ethier

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

This is a detailed and most up to date story of The Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe. Detailing all attacks from 1974 – 1981, while also delving deep into the severe failings by Yorkshire police.

Using home office files and interviews from the women that survived the attacks, it gives a detailed look at his confession in 1981 and then 1992 and using a note from one of the survivors.

I love all True Crime books and suspect like everyone else that also like this genre, is because I find it fascinating trying to get inside the mind of these people, when we cannot get to grips on how or why they think the way they do…. How can someone think that it is ok to Murder, or think it is normal doing such things.

This book does not disappoint if you like True Crime. I have seen documentaries of the Ripper, and off course the new Drama that was released last year. But even though I had seen these, I did not realise the true extent on what Peter Sutcliffe did to these women. A total of 32 women was Murdered or attacked in the Leeds, Bradford and Manchester areas, using his job as a Lorry driver to commit these crimes.

We learn from the author, his childhood, with friends and family friends, commenting that he was weird and would not mix with other people when he was a teenager, leading to his first encounter with a prostitute and what made him despise them so much.

However, although I was shocked on the attacks he confessed too, to learn the extent of the failings by the police, was shocking. We learn that the ripper was interviewed 9 separate times, and except from the last time he was interviewed, his house was never searched correctly, meaning the most crucial items was never detained.
Sutcliffe’s best friend also reported him to the police on 2 occasions, saying he fitted the description of the Ripper and the MO. The first was a letter that was sent to the police and the second when he visited a police station. It made me feel so angry towards the police, so God knows how the surviving victims and families of the women that was murdered, feel! I think once they started to make mistakes, they just got bigger and bigger and was unable to pull it back.

This book was brilliant, so many facts from the investigation and what Sutcliffe was like. Chris Cook has done an amazing job, retrieving all this information, so we can enjoy reading it, this is a must have for any True Crime fans and one of the best Non-fiction books I have read.

NetGalley, Joanne Ellis

True crime lovers will find this fascinating, with a strong focus on the background of the killer as well as detailed insights into the society of the time and how attitudes impacted the investigation. A terrific addition to the already extensive writing about this dreadful case.

NetGalley, Louise Gray