Customer Reviews

American Homicide

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Actually you'll find it's murder most political. I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Roth on my show. He presents extremely interesting information and arguments backed by lots of very meticulous, painstaking research. Dr. Roth is a very compassionate and thoughtful man who uses murder, of all things, to help us better comprehend ourselves and our behavior. This book will forever alter your understanding of both murder and politics. Don't miss it!

Okay, I admit it. I am only posting this review to balance the poor numbers of Jade Queen's review. C'mon now JQ! You didn't even read the book? Yes, I listened to the interview too and found Professor Roth's comments interesting and well-reasoned. I understand taking issue with an author's conclusions, but, hey, read the book FIRST!

"American Homicide" is on the ROROTOKO list of cutting-edge intellectual nonfiction. Professor Roth's book interview ran here as the cover feature on August 30, 2010.

American Homicide is a 'must-read' for anyone who wants to better understand the act of murder. Roth is an amazing researcher and powerful voice. Don't let the thickness of this book keep you from reading it!

I confess right away that my review is based on Mr. Roth's interview on Radio West, and not on the book itself.
Nevertheless, it seems to me hard to inversely correlate the rather vague notion of "trust in government" with the homicide rate. The more direct and obvious correlation seems to exist between the reintroduction of trained killers (veterans) into society after a war. This seems to me to be the cause in those cases cited by Mr. Roth: Cromwellian England, Napoleonic France, the U.S. after the Civil War, the U.S. after the Vietnam War. A good statistical refutation of my suggestion would be to count only those solved homicides where the perpetrator had no military training, and compare these numbers across all countries in the study.
I still plan to read the book: Mr. Roth's manner seems to be reasonable, scientific, and non-political.