Mother's Day (Hardcover)

~ (Author) "As the crow flies, Rio Linda is a hundred miles due west of the Donner Pass..." (more)
Key Phrases: Rio Linda, Bob Knorr, Chet Harris (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Theresa Cross was a toxic mother, but the maternity myth blinded, deafened, and silenced those that might have stopped her." Dennis McDougal, with his flair for storytelling and his eye for vivid detail, is one of the best of true crime writers. In this book he profiles a very dark character indeed: a woman for whom neither her life nor her fantasies ever got beyond her sad, narrow world of severe men, twisted religious ideas, beatings, sexual jealousy, horror fiction and movies, and obsessive housecleaning. She had several husbands, one of whom she killed, until she ended up as a single mother with two boys and three girls. Then she began to torture and kill the girls, one after another, as they became old enough that their beauty made her angry. Prepare to enter a closed-off realm of nightmare, when you read this one.

Product Description

A MODERN MURDEROUS MEDEA...
In June of l985, while her teenage sons held their half-sister down, Theresa Cross beat her l9-year-old daughter Sheila unconscious and then stuffed her into a 2' X 2' storage locker. After three days, the knocking, kicking, and cries stopped. Theresa and her sons dumped the girl's body in the desolate High Sierras....
The summer before, Theresa had dug a bullet out of her daughter Suesan's chest with a paring knife. When Suesan failed to recover (without benefit of doctors or hospital), Theresa and her two sons drove the delirious girl to the mountains , doused her with gasoline, and set her on fire....
For nearly nine years, Theresa Cross Knorr got away with murder, until her youngest daughter, Terry Knorr Graves, finally found a cop who believed the incredible story of her two murdered sisters.
That story is all here, the shocking life of a woman whose violence, jealousy, rage, and domination led to a brutally heinous crime of ruthless ferocity.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Fawcett (June 27, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0449149307
• ISBN-13: 978-0449149300
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.3 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #650,763 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Shocking and disturbing, October 20, 1999

By A Customer

I found the book to be very interesting, however, I feel like the book does not have an end. Most books of this nature provide a full ending to the story. This story has no ending for the reader. I'm sure that anyone else who reads this book will agree that they are left in suspense. I want to know what happened to Theresa Cross after she was initially arrested. I would like to read about the court case and what transpired while in the court room. At the very least, I would like to know what her sentence was. I have looked on the internet and have not been successful in finding any pertinent information regarding Theresa Cross. I would really like to see a sequel to the book, Mother's Day. According to the other reviews, the story was also discussed on a talk show. Does anyone know the name of the talk show? I would like to get the transcripts and would like to know that this disturbed lady got what she deserved....

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Chilling...., June 10, 2003

By	Lorrie Berg (Conrad, MT.) - See all my reviews

I read this book years and years ago. It's still one of my favorite true crime books. I can't believe the horror the kids had to go through just to live in Teressa's twisted world and the scars it left on her children into adulthood. Upon reading it, I had nightmares for a while. This is the only book that has had that much of an impact on me, I still find it amazing. The author, I think, does a fantastic job with detailing scenery, dialogue, etc. It's a wonderful book. Too bad it's true...

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very sad story, July 16, 2000

By	"tonlo" (Pembroke Pines, Florida USA) - See all my reviews

This crime should have never happened(not that any should) I was so angry while reading this that no one helped these children and that Theresa got away with everything for so long. Will her remaining children ever be ok? My only complaints of the book are there should have been pictures, I wanted to know what everyone looked like.