Black Dahlia Avenger: A Genius for Murder (Paperback)

by Steve Hodel (Author) "It was mid-week, Thursday evening at 6:30 p.m..." (more)
Key Phrases: incest trial, black dahlia, juvenile detectives, Los Angeles, Elizabeth Short, George Hodel (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
For 56 years, the Black Dahlia murder case remained one of the most notorious and high-profile unsolved crimes of the 20th century. Now, Steve Hodel, a 24-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department, believes he has finally solved the case. On January 15, 1947, 22-year-old Elizabeth Short—"The Black Dahlia"—was found dead in a vacant lot in Los Angeles, her body horribly mutilated, bisected at the waist, and posed in a bizarre manner. The horrific crime shocked the country and commanded headlines for months as the killer taunted the police with notes and phone calls. Despite the massive manhunt, the murderer was never found.

Hodel began working on the case after he retired from the LAPD when he chanced upon an intriguing piece of evidence that led him on trail that he had no choice but to follow since it pertained directly to him. As he dug deeper, he came to believe that the killer was also responsible for over a dozen other unsolved murders in the Los Angeles area around the same time. He also found copious evidence of corruption at the LAPD, leading him to accuse the department top brass of covering up the Black Dahlia murder in order to conceal a deeper conspiracy involving crooked politicians and gangsters.

Despite a lack of physical evidence (which had been destroyed), Hodel is able to connect numerous dots and make a plausible case, complete with lurid tales of wild orgies that were attended by celebrities such as the artist Man Ray, the director John Huston, and a host of other Hollywood elites. He also discloses his killer’s obsession with the Marquis de Sade and Jack the Ripper and how he modeled his own crimes on their behavior. In particular, there is a disturbing connection between the work of Man Ray and the horrific circumstances of Short’s murder. It is doubtful that this will be the final word on the Black Dahlia murder—too much myth surrounds it and much of his evidence is circumstantial--but Hodel’s labyrinthine tale adds much to this intriguing case. --Shawn Carkonen --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review
"[Hodel] has written an intensely readable account.Has [he] solved the case? I think so." (--Jon L. Breen, Weekly Standard )

"Former Los Angeles police detective Steve Hodel has written one of the most compelling true-crime books of all time." (Seattle Weekly )

"A fascinating family psychodrama; we watch [Hodel's] image of his father morph from flawed but lovable ladies' man to monster." (Newsweek )

"George Hodel, I think is fit company for some of noir's most civilized villains." (--David Thomson, New York Times Book Review )

"Hodel tells the story well and with incredible objectivity." (Richmond Times-Dispatch )

"The best nonfiction book about L.A. crime I have ever read." (Gerald Petievich, author of The Sentinel and To Live and Die in L.A. )

"We can only glimpse who Betty Short was--but now we know who killed her, and why." (-- James Ellroy, from his foreword )

"This unsparing, chilling account of the actions of a perfect psychopath grips to the end." (Toronto Globe and Mail )

"The most haunting murder mystery in Los Angeles county...has finally been solved." (-- Stephen R. Kay, L.A. County Head Deputy District Attorney ) --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 592 pages
• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks (June 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060589957
• ISBN-13: 978-0060589950
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (198 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #679,598 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

66 of 78 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Recently released evidence supports author's claims, May 15, 2003

By	Walrus Rex "rexferal" (Grand Junction, CO United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Black Dahlia Avenger: The True Story (Hardcover)

Quoting from AP reporter Linda Deutsch's review of this book as published in Denver's Rocky Mountain News on April 15, 2003:

"When District Attorney Steven Cooley decided recently to release the long-secret files on the [Black Dahlia] case, Steve Hodel's theory gained substance. His father's photograph was in the file, along with transcripts of electronic surveillance on his home for three weeks in 1950.

The reports on onionskin paper that is yellowed make clear that Dr. Hodel was a prime suspect in the investigation of Short's murder. . . . The transcripts of overheard conversations include a statement in Hodel's voice saying, 'Supposin' I did kill the Black Dahlia. They couldn't prove it now. They can't talk to my secretary anymore because she's dead.'"

This may not be conclusive (and may well be to obscure for anyone who has not read the book) but it does prove that Dr. Hodel was the wealthy and influential Hollywood resident referred to by the grand jury and it proves that the LAPD or the DA's investigators zeroed in on Dr. Hodel without benefit of the two pictures that may or may not be Short that began the author's investigation.

I, of course, do not know whether the author's theory is wrong or right. I found this book to be highly entertaining and I think that it may have lit a fuse that may solve the case once and for all. At the very least, it has caused previously secret files to be released. I see a film all right, but not an Oliver Stone film, this should be a film by somebody who cares whether a story is true or false. This theory deserves to be taken seriously.

25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Extraordinary, April 13, 2003

By	N. L. Seaver "N.L. Seaver" (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Black Dahlia Avenger: The True Story (Hardcover)

I knew nothing about The Black Dahlia murder when I picked this book up. I made the mistake of reading the first chapter when I got home, and ended up compelled to read this cover to cover over the next 36 hours. As Hodel peels back the many layers of this tale of mid-century LAPD corruption, Hollywood lust and glamour, personal family drama and serial murder, he balances the explication of rigorous detective and forensic work with a true storyteller's sense of drama. This expose sheds light on the many dark corners of our justice system, the underside of Los Angeles and indeed the human psyche - and makes the stuff of Elmore Leonard, Raymond Chandler and James Ellroy nearly pale by comparison. Like a true crime cross between Silence of the Lambs and L.A. Confidential. Strongly recommend. Be warned however - the material here is gruesome at times, and not for the faint of heart.

36 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Man Ray angle is bogus -- you could look it up, June 2, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Black Dahlia Avenger: The True Story (Hardcover)

Part of Steve Hodel's "proof" that his father, Dr. George Hodel, was the Black Dahlia killer, rests on Dr. Hodel's supposed close relationship with artist and photographer Man Ray, whom the author claims shared his father's "sadistic" personality. Hodel's case against his father is flimsy enough, but he really falls off a cliff when he brings in Man Ray, about whom much is known and documented.

Let's start with concrete, verifiable facts. Hodel claims that Man Ray left Hollywood and moved back to France in the winter of 1949-1950, just after Dr. Hodel's incest trial, for fear of being implicated in the sex crimes scandal himself. Hodel's source for this information is a man named Joe Barrett, who says he rented part of Dr. Hodel's house from 1948 through 1950. Barrett claims that Man Ray came to the house to say goodbye to Dr. Hodel just before leaving the country, and while he was there talked to Barrett for an hour. In reality, Man Ray did not leave Hollywood until March of 1951, a year after Dr. Hodel had fled and sold the house in question. Incredibly, Barrett, who "remembers" things that could not have happened, is Hodel's main source tying Man Ray to his father as a regular associate. Nothing known about Man Ray supports this claim, and the only real evidence Hodel presents indicates no more than a minor professional relationship.

Hodel claims that Man Ray went to France for several months during the height of the Black Dahlia murder investigation. According to Hodel's own book, the height of the investigation ran from late January through March of 1947, although Hodel says the supposed police cover-up of his father's guilt was underway by February. In reality, Man Ray made his first and only extended trip from Hollywood in August of 1947, months after the case had gone cold.

Hodel's dubious sources also claim that Man Ray's "clout" as a famous artist kept him out of Dr. Hodel's sex crimes trial, leaving the impression that Man Ray enjoyed the same stature then as he does now. In reality, Man Ray was not particularly well known in the US in the 1940s, especially not on the West Coast, nor was he particularly well off. Whatever repute he had was mainly as a portrait and fashion photographer, two things he did only for money and wanted to get away from. For perspective, consider the painting "The Lovers", which Hodel correctly identifies as one of Man Ray's best-known works. When last sold in 1979, it set a record for the most paid for a surrealist painting. But for most of Man Ray's decade in Hollywood, it gathered dust in his apartment. He finally sold it in 1948, for $2000. It's hard to see where Man Ray would have gotten the clout to keep himself out of a criminal investigation when he didn't even have the clout to sell his best work.

All this information is readily available in the standard biography of the artist by Neil Baldwin. Man Ray's travel and financial affairs are well documented through his correspondence with his sister, who, with her husband, acted as his agent, business manager, and accountant.

Now to Hodel's wild claims about Man Ray's supposedly sadistic personality, which Hodel uses, by extension, to show his like-minded father was capable of the Black Dahlia murder. Hodel tosses out whoppers like "Man Ray was a devoted sadist" who "believed women exist for man's pleasure, which is only enhanced through the humiliation, degradation, and infliction of pain upon them," yet fails to adduce any proof. Not surprisingly, because none exists. In reality, the worst that can be said about Man Ray is that some minority of his work contains sadistic elements. When asked about works that showed this tendency, he told an early biographer: "I did them because I would hate doing anything like them in real life."

I suppose a negative can never be proven absolutely, but Man Ray has been the subject of steady biographical inquiry for the last 20 years. Two of his long-term lovers have garnered biographical studies in their own right. While Man Ray could be difficult, and there's credible evidence that he got into physical altercations with one lover (she hit him, too -- and was bigger), there is nothing to suggest anything remotely like what Hodel claims. Not even rumors. As for Man Ray's attitudes toward women, although not entirely politically correct by today's standard, they were enlightened for a man of his generation. He took his female colleagues seriously as fellow artists, encouraged the women around him (friends, lovers, and relatives) in their artistic endeavors, and maintained warm friendships with women who offered him no sexual opportunities, including most of his ex-lovers.

Hodel's only attempt to show, rather than assert, that Man Ray was a "sadist" is to invoke the Marquis de Sade, whom Man Ray admired as a writer and social critic, and for his obstinacy toward institutional authority. Saying that admiring Sade makes someone a "sadist", in the common or clinical sense, is evidence of nothing except Hodel's willingness to play semantic games and presume his reader's stupidity.

All this is bad enough by itself, but Hodel's main proof that his father was an extreme sadist, capable of committing the Black Dahlia murder, is that HE admired Sade, and, well, was a lot like Man Ray.

The only allegations Hodel makes against his father that have any credibility are that Dr. Hodel molested, or at least acted sexually inappropriately toward, his daughter and granddaughter. But these acts, as described, could not be called "sadistic" in the language of sex-crime psychology. It's a long way from there to torture-and-mutilation murder. If Dr. George Hodel molested his daughter or granddaughter, he should have gone to jail. But what does that have to do with the Black Dahlia case? Like most of this book, not much.