Customer Reviews

Deadly American Beauty (St. Martin's True Crime Library)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I don't know if it was the content, the writing, or Kristen Rossum's soul, but this book just didn't come across to me as very memorable. I saw the story on Dateline or some other show, and that's why I bought the book. I wanted to get the rest of the story, but there really wasn't much more there. I found the book overall to be unsatisfying.

Being a fan of true crime, I picked up this book thinking "this should be an interesting read" however, it was the exact opposite. The Author never really gave much depth to the characters.....maybe they just didn't have any depth. We never find out the reason for Kristen Rossum's raging drug abuse (although it was hinted that an injury ending her chances at becoming a ballerina did it). So what she comes off as, is a spoiled child (which is probably the real reason for her drug abuse)who marries a man, who helps her (for awhile), get off drugs -- which she repays by killing him -- so she could be with her married lover. Sounds like a soap opera....a bad one. If you really want to read a good true crime try "Dead and Buried", "Lethal Intent" or "Scream at the Sky"....definately interesting reads.

Perhaps my one star is a bit premature as I only started the book last night.

However some glaring errors like using "border" instead of "boarder" and Patricia "Cornwall" instead of "Cornwell" and Kay "Scarpella" instead of "Scarpetta" did not make last evening's reading experience a great one.

Errors like that, especially in a nonfiction book, make me question credibility.

Being someone that is very familiar with the case, I found this book to stretch the truth a little bit and become over dramatic about some of the personality traits of Kristin. It did present quite a bit of the evidence on the prosecutions part, and played down the defenses case. I am not saying that she is innocent, only she knows that, but this book works very hard against her. It reminds me of reading a tabloid, the truthful parts are blended with some sensationalism to keep the readers interest.

I feel a little bad about saying that I was disappointed in this book, in that it's a story of a real murder, in which a real person died under awful circumstances, and in judging the book on its literary merits it's hard to avoid seeming to trivialize Greg Villiers' death and the very real grief and anger of his family and friends.

But nonetheless, it's fundamentally a fairly simple story that's padded out to nearly 300 often repetive and overly sensationalistic pages. It's called an "almost perfect crime" - in fact, at least to go by the book's narrative, Kristin Rossum made so many mistakes and lapses in judgement it's hard to believe that she wouldn't have eventually been found out. The police seem mostly competentent, but not engagingly brilliant.

The callousness of the crime is indeed shocking, but ultimately it seems that you've just got a woman who was desperate and/or drug-addled enough to want her husband dead, and for whatever reason, cold-blooded enough to go through with it. And so it comes down to standard motive/means police work. Not that there's anything wrong with solving murders, I just hoped for a more psychologically interesting story.

Maybe 100 years ago this would have made a good opera - but it's a disappointing book.

This is the best true crime book I have read for years. John Glatt does an excellent job of unravelling this intriguing and incredible story of sex, drugs and an unbelievably horrible and cruel murder.

He makes the story of the beautiful forensic toxicologist Kristin Rossum come alive in his vivid and brilliantly researched account of one of the most brutal and callous murders ever committed.

As a resident of San Diego I followed this case from the beginning, through it's amazing twists and turns. I want to congratulate Glatt on a job well done and I thoroughly recommend it to all true crime lovers.

I will admit, I am not one to read true crime books, so I maybe off the mark in this review, but overall I was not too happy with this book. I never felt like I really knew the people (they almost seemed stiff or cardboardy, for a lack of a better word) and the author seemed to repeat a lot of information, in an effort to make it a longer book, I guess. I think he could have cut out much of the repeats and cut the length down quite a bit.

I also question the phrase "almost perfect murder" because honestly, Kristin was so hyped up on meth when she killed her husband, she wasn't thinking straight at all. To buy the rose at Vons with a debit card instead of cash, and then also use her Vons store discount card to boot, was nothing short of completely retarded. Her stories varied by the moment, and she freely admitted to lying. This was supposed to be the great master mind behind the "almost perfect murder"? Maybe she was smart when she wasn't high, but that didn't seem to happen very often.

If you're a huge fan of true crime books, and can't find anything else to read, you can pick this one up at the library, but otherwise I'd say skip it and spend your time reading something interesting. This author seems very interested in hype and sensationalism, and not much else.

As a native southern Californian, I caught many technical/research errors in Glatt's book that I found distracting. For example, he wrote that Claremont lies 30 miles WEST of L.A., which would put you into the Pacific Ocean (he should have said EAST). Plus, he continously spelled people's names incorrectly, got the name of Kristin's middle school wrong ("Claremont Junior High School" does not exist in California), and there are just too many other errors to list here. I don't know if it was the fault of the author or his editor, but still, it left the reader wondering if this author could be believed at all. I recommend Caitlin Rother's book about Kristin Rossum because it was much more accurate and well researched. Glatt tried to make his book "sexy" by focusing on the salacious elements of the story, while Rother presented a much more objective and factual account.

If ever a book served as proof that drugs do terrible things to people--and potentially far worse to those innocent victims closest to them--then this is the one. It also serves as a vivid example of why you should "never judge a book by its cover." Physically beautiful though she may be, Kristin Rossum is exactly the opposite inside.

Glatt paints a portrait of Kristin as a stunningly lovely, highly intelligent toxicologist, with a dark side that clearly takes over completely once she begins using drugs. We are led to believe that an injury suffered years earlier, which prevented her from pursuing her promising ballet career, was the impetus for her descent into drug abuse. Perhaps...

Yet, as I read this book I got the uncomfortable feeling that the only real "excuse" for her actions is the fact that something is missing in her very soul. She reminds me of sociopathic Pam Smart, the murderess from NH who enticed students into doing her bidding by killing her husband (also named Gregg). Both "Gregs" were very good guys, yet both of their pretty wives appeared to have ice cold blood in their veins. In Rossum's case, drugs joined that ice water, setting the stage for a real tragedy.

How terribly sad that Ms. Rossum would end up murdering Greg de Villers, the one man who truly cared enough to forgive her for past transgressions (of which there were many) and go above and beyond to save her. Depicted as heartbreakingly kind, extremely handsome, talented, and a rising young star in the business world, this was a young man who most women would have been only too proud to marry.

His biggest "flaw" seemed to be giving someone like Kristin endless chances to redeem herself, much as she didn't deserve them. He did everything in his power to bring out her good side and help her leave her drug habit--and the shocking behavior that went along with the substance abuse. He offered her the wonderful gift of unconditional love--if only she had embraced it. Probably fully realizing she couldn't, though, I wish she had refused it and allowed him to move on to someone else--a young lady worthy of him and appreciative of his good character.

Instead, Kristin reluctantly goes through with the marriage despite 2nd thoughts, thereby dooming Greg to a short and miserable life with her.

As much as it is a mystery why she would even WANT to cheat on Greg, it is also a mystery to me why she picked Michael Robertson to do it with! In every possible way, he seemed far beneath Greg de Villers. Gambling her entire future to murder for THIS CAD defies belief. And sure enough, in the end he was not by her side in any way, but back home in Australia.

Yet another mysterious aspect of the entire sequence of events is the behavior of Rossum's parents. I was frankly ashamed of Ralph and Constance Rossum. Understandably, no parent wants to think their own child is a murderer. However, even if they could not accept what I consider a foregone conclusion--that their daughter did commit this horrible deed--the least they could have done is show even a cursory display of sympathy for Greg's suffering family, and not tell outright lies about their dead son, simply to save their daughter's duplicitous neck. Instead, they engage in outrageous pettiness, like quibbling with Marie DeVillers about whether she had the "right" to use wedding photos Constance paid for. It's as if image and money are the "end all and be all" for these people--all they care about is twisting the truth to spare their daughter the prison fate she deserves, looking good to the public, and making money off the story. For such a "respectable" couple, I personally found their integrity sadly lacking.

Meanwhile, single Mom Marie de Villers kept her dignity, and sons Bertrand and Jerome loyally defended their brother Greg's memory to the end. It was equally obvious that Greg's colleagues at Orbigen deeply cared for him. Their concern was touching, and a more fitting tribute to him than the insincere displays of grief from the Rossum's. It was nice to know that amidst all of the evil, there were still some heroes here.

As painful as it is to read Glatt's well researched book and realize that the story is true, I am glad I read it, if only to be able to join Greg de Viller's family and friends in expressing deep regret for the loss of such an exemplary young man.

More than the story, I purchased this book because I am a fan of true crime writer John Glatt's other work. With some of the circumstances of the story, the book had the potential to be as good as any murder mystery. Yet the flow of the book makes evident that there was not enough to make this a really good read.

"Deadly American Beauty" tells the story of Kristin Rossum and the murder she committed by poisoning her husband Greg de Villers. First, readers will know that Kristin is very attractive. Readers will know this because the author keeps repeating it even though we know a person can not be too attractive with skin abcesses all over her face from cystal meth usage. Her husband Greg, who helped he clean up her life, was found dead in a situation that was too surreal for even a Hollywood writer. This leads to suspicions by Greg's family that would reveal a love triangle and evidence that almost too clearly leads to Kristin.

Perhaps what bothered me most in this story is that somebody with a history of drug problems could be allowed to work in the the medical examiner's office with easy access to confiscated drugs. Kristin's rise in the workplace had dubious links to Greg's demise.

I enjoy reading Glatt's work, but this is not one of his better efforts. As other reviewers have noted, there is a lot of repitition in the storytelling. While the story is compelling, the repitition can be frustrating and makes the story seem thin.