Boy is that a long title.
I'm going to be reviewing this book by chapter, maybe every two since there are only nine.
Reader discretion advised for gore.
So chapter one so far, titled "Imagining Murder" is about the first string of murders in England that really set things off. Normally here would only be one murder a year, and then all of a sudden a family of three and the husbands apprentice where brutally killed.
"Marr and his apprentice were lying in the shop, battered to death...Mrs. Marr was lying dead halfway to the door leading downstairs...Meanwhile Margaret Jewell rushed in with a group of excited bystanders. looking for the baby. They found him lying in his cradle in the kitchen, his throat cut."
A lot of hype is made about murders back then. It's almost a family affair to see the scene and the bodies and go to the funeral wether you knew the people or not. Flyers and these things called Broadsides were sold too which according to Wikipedia, are like posters with information on them, but only if you type in the 18th century as well because otherwise you get parts of ships like if you use dictionary.
Then, pretty much the next day, guess what happens. On page seven, four pages later after the first murder, three more people. Same way, slit throats and bashed skulls.
They found a supposed killer, and then he committed suicide by hanging himself in the jail-cell. Everyone saw it as an outright admission to the murders, so his body was publicly shamed. Before the shaming though everyone was just spreading rumors and sensationalism like the plague it was ridiculous. The fact that no one had anything better to do asides from talk to one another made things spread even faster.
All of this hype over time caused what we now know as the standard police force to form due to citizen request of more security. At was mostly just a collage of individual forces run by the many parishes that were in the areas. Eventually the government and Parliament started to regulate everything.
This was also the time where crime started to come up as a genera. A series of memoirs about a Detective sparked a couple of screenplays. At the very end of the chapter a series of satirical essays written by Thomas de Quincey is mentioned to view and speak about murder as the newest fine art. Quite an interesting point I think, since he was correct about how interested people are in the murders themselves, but not the actual victims. We really haven't changes much.
To be honest over all it's really quite boringly written so far. I was hoping she would write more like Sarah Vowell, -who I am rather fond of- but it's really just strait and to the point. Perhaps It'll have more individuality and flare as I go on.
I'm going to be reviewing this book by chapter, maybe every two since there are only nine.
Reader discretion advised for gore.
So chapter one so far, titled "Imagining Murder" is about the first string of murders in England that really set things off. Normally here would only be one murder a year, and then all of a sudden a family of three and the husbands apprentice where brutally killed.
"Marr and his apprentice were lying in the shop, battered to death...Mrs. Marr was lying dead halfway to the door leading downstairs...Meanwhile Margaret Jewell rushed in with a group of excited bystanders. looking for the baby. They found him lying in his cradle in the kitchen, his throat cut."
A lot of hype is made about murders back then. It's almost a family affair to see the scene and the bodies and go to the funeral wether you knew the people or not. Flyers and these things called Broadsides were sold too which according to Wikipedia, are like posters with information on them, but only if you type in the 18th century as well because otherwise you get parts of ships like if you use dictionary.
Then, pretty much the next day, guess what happens. On page seven, four pages later after the first murder, three more people. Same way, slit throats and bashed skulls.
They found a supposed killer, and then he committed suicide by hanging himself in the jail-cell. Everyone saw it as an outright admission to the murders, so his body was publicly shamed. Before the shaming though everyone was just spreading rumors and sensationalism like the plague it was ridiculous. The fact that no one had anything better to do asides from talk to one another made things spread even faster.
All of this hype over time caused what we now know as the standard police force to form due to citizen request of more security. At was mostly just a collage of individual forces run by the many parishes that were in the areas. Eventually the government and Parliament started to regulate everything.
This was also the time where crime started to come up as a genera. A series of memoirs about a Detective sparked a couple of screenplays. At the very end of the chapter a series of satirical essays written by Thomas de Quincey is mentioned to view and speak about murder as the newest fine art. Quite an interesting point I think, since he was correct about how interested people are in the murders themselves, but not the actual victims. We really haven't changes much.
To be honest over all it's really quite boringly written so far. I was hoping she would write more like Sarah Vowell, -who I am rather fond of- but it's really just strait and to the point. Perhaps It'll have more individuality and flare as I go on.
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