Customer Reviews

The Misbegotten Son: The True Story of Arthur J. Shawcross

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Arthur Shawcross is to be pitied, but you just cannot. From the time he was a child, he knew he was "different," but never knew why, nor did he receive any insights by family or counselors. Shawcross grew up in a tiny village in upstate New York, quit school in the 9th grade after being held back twice, served in the Army and then his life fell apart. He brutally murdered 10-year old Jack Blake, for which he was suspected but never arrested. He subsequently murdered 8-year old Karen Hill and was convicted. After plea-bargaining, he received a 25-year sentence of which he served 14+ years and was released on parole.

Why was he released? Basically because he was cunning and shrewd. He did everything he could to be a model prisoner, and none of the mental health team could diagnose him. Though a few psychologists thought he should never be allowed to live in an open society, there was little they could do to hold him beyond 15 years. Shortly after his release, he began a two-year killing spree, murdering 11 prostitutes before being captured. I had the strong feeling there were many more murders that we will never know about.

Jack Olsen takes us through Arthur's life via an oral history and taped Q and A interview with Shawcross. The book is brilliant. By letting the people closest to Shawcross tell their stories in their own words, interwoven with dispassionate analysis, the author rivets our attention and interest. At the conclusion, a dogged psychiatrist finally uncovers that Arthur has a severe biological impairment, an extra Y chromosome and a little known compound that is a marker for violent behavior. The two together were biological dynamite.

Arthur Shawcross's story is fascinating. It brings to the forefront "nature vs. nurture" arguments. It appears Arthur would have been no different regardless of where and how he had been raised. Mr. Olson brings Arthur, his family and friends, and his victims brilliantly to life.

...one of the best books, period! Jack Olson gathered an enormous amount of first person inteviews with victims, families, psychiatrists, and Shawcross himself. Instead of getting fancy with the order of events (a la Don Lasseter), he logically lays it out for the reader. Shawcross is one sick pup and you'll get to know him real well by th time you put this book down. Only drawback--no pictures! Check out one the the cable companies' serial killer profiles to see what Shawcross looks like and his venues of murder.

I found this book very disturbing and I have read many books on serial killers. I thought Arthur Shawcross was one of the most fascinating serial killers until I read this book. It is very well written and unfortunatley you get to know the families / friends of the victims which makes it very difficult to read without becoming emotional, especially concerning his child victims - God rest their souls - I take my hat off to Jack Olsen and the way he wrote a brilliant account, with victims and families in mind, of one very sick individual. Be ready to have your world rocked and faith in humanity almost lost. I will never read anything on Arthur Shawcross again - maybe this is in respect to his victims or just plain disgust with one man who was let loose on society thanks to an overcrowded prison system and parol officers who did not have enough information to make such a decision. You really feel for the victims in this one - very upsetting. A really, really good read.

The book is magistrally planned and written and kept me involved from page 1 to page 592.Jack Olsen is surely worth all the 5 stars for his professional style and knowledge. I highly recommend this book to whoever is keen on true crime.

Very simply: Jack Olsen put together this amazing book that not only had me engaged so intensely that I read it straight through, but it was the book that got me "addicted" to the true crime books. Every other book I read, I hold up in comparison. None have outshone it. The descriptions of the lives and times of the people in the book are so enlivening, you begin to feel you know them in a most authentic way. The book touched and moved me, educated me in the sick ways of a serial killer as well as the sick ways of a society that turns them loose. I strongly recommend, no, I INSIST people read this book. You will not be disappointed! And if you've never read Jack Olsen before, start now.

Jack Olsen's ability to capture that incredible time of fear and disbelief ( as one who lived there when this horror unfolded )was beyond my wildest expectations. Often when writers focus on a small town, and a huge story within it, many of the details of the city and its denizens are lost to the story's villian, not so in "The Misbegotten Son".

I felt as though I was actually walking the streets of Watertown, NY as I did growing up in that pleasant community so many years ago. The names of the town officials, attorneys, and law enforcement were so startling accurate, it made the hunt for this serial killer renewed, and as frightening as it was those many years ago.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is prepared for a shocking look into the mind of a demented and lost soul. If you love a ghoulish look into human-kind, "The Misbegotten Son" is a must Read!

Raising as many questions as it answers, allowing its characters to speak in their own words/voices, and unflinchingly looking into the very worst of human behavior, Jack Olsen's The Misbegotten Son rings like Dostoevsky plopped down in upstate New York and in the presence of Arthur Shawcross. Olsen died recently, stripping true crime of a master bringer of news about murderers and rapists who, as it turns out, are always and despite their atrocities, human beings more similar to you and me than different. Olsen is a demon researcher and dug up a ton of first-person narratives having to do with the dozens of women and children Shawcross killed. Besides the words of Shawcross himself--whose pathology baffled plenty of shrinks--Olsen lets us hear from victims' relatives, cops, doctors, Shawcross's wives and girlfriends. Then Olsen arranges the material so that we never lose sight of those destroyed by Shawcross and, at the same time, spend a lot of time in Art's presence and listening to him and the women who loved him talk about things from their points of view. Olsen is too good to reduce evil to a single-shot cause--lousy childhood, no "role models," neuropathology--what's being turned over and meditated on in The Misbegotten Son is far more mysterious and complex and important to be turned into a pop-psych conclusion. Instead he takes us as far as he and we can go into the specifics of the horror, gives us what he knows to be worth some thought, and leaves it to us to draw lessons if we can. A tremendous book judged on any terms.

This is the finest crime/mystery book I have ever read. This book is chilling! Once you pick it up, you won't put it down, and once you read it, you won't forget it!

I was born and reside in Rochester, NY and recall when all of this mayhem was taking place. Jack Olsen does a magnificent job of covering all of the details of the Shawcross story along with precise facts on how, when and where things occurred. Wonderful book!

I couldn't even estimate how many true crime books I've read over the years, and this is, by far, the best ever. What has frustrated me about most of these books is that they don't go very deeply into the WHY's and HOW's---Why did this happen? How did this guy get this way? This book, The Misbegotten Son, not only delves deeply into all that, it does so, eventually, at the molecular-genetic level (literally). Plus, the extensive research that also went into the lives and backgrounds of all parties involved is absolutely amazing. I hate to use such a banal phrase, but I really could not put this book down; I stayed awake for two days straight, savoring every word. The only "bad" thing about this book is that it has probably spoiled me...I can't imagine any future book coming close. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant!