The Want-Ad Killer (True Crime) (Mass Market Paperback)

by Ann Rule (Author), Andy Stack (Contributor) "Harvey Louis Carignan's birthday was in May-just as Kathy Miller's was, possibly the only thing they shared in common..." (more)
Key Phrases: detective team, Harvey Carignan, Kathy Miller, Duane Homan (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
After his first grisly crime, Harvey Louis Carignan beat a death sentence and continued to manipulate, rape, and bludgeon women to death--using want ads to lure his young female victims.

And time after time, justice was thwarted by a killer whose twisted legal genius was matched only by his sick savagery.

Here, complete with the testimony of women who suffered his unspeakable sexual abuses and barely escaped with their lives, and of the police who at last put him behind bars, is one of the most shattering and thought-provoking true-crime stories of our time.

* Includes 8 pages of photographs
* From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Small Sacrifices, Lust Killer, The Stranger Beside Me, and The I-5 Killer

* "Rule has an instinct for suspense."--Washington Post Book World

* "Rule springs surprises and revelations with a novelist's skill."--Seattle Times

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Signet (September 1, 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0141182008
• ISBN-13: 978-0451166883
• ASIN: 0451166884
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #191,328 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Want-Ad Killer Holds Interest, December 24, 2000

By	J. C. (Thailand) - See all my reviews

Ann Rule wrote this book in 1983. My only complaint is there is no update on the case since 1983. Otherwise, the book is excellent of course, since Ann Rule is a genius at crime writing. In 1972 Laura Leslie Brock disappeared while hitchhiking in Washington state. Her body was later found. Mary Miller read the newspaper story to her 15 year old daughter because they always talked about these kind of things so the daughter would know about the world. How horrible when in 1973 the daughter read a want ad for a job and agreed to meet someone, who turned out to be involved in the Laura Leslie Brock murder! You won't be able to put this book down. And it doesn't get too involved in the court case either. Ann Rule's later books might be more well crafted but this one has genius written all over it too.

32 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Early Ann, February 16, 2002

By	Mcgivern Owen L (NY, NY USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

"The Want Ad Killer" represents good early Ann Rule when, for whatever reason, she wrote as Andy Stack. It is the frightening tale of Harvey Carignan, a serial killer who terrorized young women in both the Seattle and Twin Cities during the late '70s. The all too apt title refers to a teenage girl who was abducted after answering a "planted" classified ad. "WAK" is short, concise, no nonsense true crime. It is told as a police story, with little courtroom drama or legal maneuvering. There are also none of the longer, more involved sub plots of the authoress' later stories such as "And Never Let Her Go" or "Everything She Ever Wanted", making this a good choice for readers unfamiliar with her work. For the few Ann fans that have yet to read "WAK", don't think twice. A word of warning: The Ann Rule rule is in effect. Do not look at the centerfold photos or the book's cover. Far too much is revealed therein. Keep yourself in suspense for as long as possible. Parents of teenage girls will keep their daughters locked up after reading this one.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beware of the sexual, deviant psychopaths!!, May 4, 1999

By A Customer

Harvey Carignan, the sexual psycho killer in Ann Rule's The Want-Ad Killer, is so beyond the description of horrible. He was a manipulator of girls, women, the law, and in an odd way, himself.Using a hammer to 'finish' off his victims after he sodomized them in the most demeaning, dehumanizing possible ways that one can fathom, he left his victims in isolated places -- proclaiming that he was the victim, that people were out to get him as they had always been in his life. This book sickened and saddened me, as the killer himself was a victim, a victim of being unwanted by his mother and himself a likely victim of sexual abuse. Harvey Carignan was a sly and intelligent man, who, like the innocent victims he took off the earth, could have made wonderful, positive contributions to the society at large if only his life was filled with the love and understanding that his victims received while limited with the life given to them. Ann Rule is an articulate interperter when it comes to the mind of the hunter and the hunted. She knows her territory and is very good, I feel, at informing her readers of the kinds of sick people out there. I read Lust Killer, too, which I think is equally tragic in characters and circumstances. I am now reading The I-5 Killer. Her books are filled with psychology, law and the seamy underworld of the criminal. I recommend all her books. Thanks, Ann!