Digital List Price: | $9.99 |
Kindle Price: | $7.99 Save $2.00 (20%) |
Sold by: | Amazon.com Services LLC |
Your Memberships & Subscriptions
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
OK
The Unspeakable Crimes of Dr. Petiot Kindle Edition
On March 11, 1944, police were called to investigate foul-smelling smoke pouring from the chimney of an elegant private house near the Arc de Triomphe. In the basement of 21 rue Le Sueur, they made the first of many gruesome discoveries: a human hand dangling from the open door of a coal-burning stove.
Proceeding to the rear of the home, detectives found rib cages, skulls, and internal organs strewn across the floor and large piles of quicklime mixed with fragments of bone and flesh. The Gestapo had two offices in the neighborhood—were Hitler’s henchmen responsible for the carnage? Or was it the work of French Resistance fighters purging Paris of traitors and German spies?
As the investigation unfolded, a more sinister possibility emerged. The building’s owner, Dr. Marcel Petiot, was a handsome and charismatic physician whose past was littered with bizarre behavior and criminal activity. When he was finally captured eight months later, Dr. Petiot claimed he was a loyal member of the Resistance who helped kill Nazi collaborators. Prosecutors charged that he was a sadistic mass murderer who lured at least twenty-seven innocent people to their deaths with promises of escape. Estimates of the actual number of his victims ran as high as 150 men, women, and children.
From the first stages of the investigation to the sensational trial in which Dr. Petiot’s superior intelligence and perverse wit were on full display, author Thomas Maeder meticulously reconstructs one of the twentieth century’s most fascinating and lurid murder cases. Drawing on classified police files and interviews with surviving participants, The Unspeakable Crimes of Dr. Petiot is a riveting true crime saga that that “reads like a shocking psychological thriller” (Newsweek).
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherOpen Road Media
- Publication dateJune 7, 2016
- File size5061 KB
Customers who bought this item also bought
Editorial Reviews
Review
“Author Thomas Maeder handles his material perfectly. His low-key, matter-of-fact style perfectly frames the horror of the investigation and trial.” —Chicago Sun-Times
“Maeder’s book, tight as a drum, is filled with interesting sidelights . . . [that] add to the bizarre appeal of the case.” —The Washington Post
“Maeder’s book is about such a remarkable scoundrel, such a tricky bastard, such an extravagantly rotten human being, and is so well-written, with so much involvement, so much tact and wit, that I read it with unwaning fascination and excitement.” —William Steig
“First-rate.” —The Buffalo News
“A superb Grand Guignol sufficient to horrify the most avid devotee of true crime. Moreover, [Maeder’s] charm and wit make delightful reading. And he provides an unforgettable glimpse of Parisian life during the Occupation and through the post-liberation political comedies.” —The Dallas Morning News
“Thomas Maeder’s excellent full-length study of the case makes a complicated story perfectly intelligible, and gives the best possible view of Petiot’s personality.” —Julian Symons, The Times (London)
“Lively and readable . . . Gripping. It isn’t easy not to succumb, as his victims did, to the bizarre, bullying charm of Marcel Petiot.” —Julian Barnes, The Times Literary Supplement
“With the skill of a novelist, Maeder develops the case around the question that remains unanswered: Were the brutal murders of more than 60 victims the accomplishment of an ardent Resistance leader, as Petiot claimed, or the deeds of a demented and brilliantly resourceful scoundrel?” —Saturday Review
Review
Review
Review
About the Author
Product details
- ASIN : B01FTG29DK
- Publisher : Open Road Media (June 7, 2016)
- Publication date : June 7, 2016
- Language : English
- File size : 5061 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Not Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 352 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #708,544 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #843 in Biographies of Serial Killers
- #953 in Jewish History (Kindle Store)
- #1,149 in Biographies & Memoirs of Criminals
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more
Customer reviews
Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.
To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.
Learn more how customers reviews work on Amazon-
Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
There are a fair few questions about Petiot's murders, the victims, and Petiot himself that remain unanswered, so Maeder's account is in a sense confined and no doubt because of that can occasionally seem simply a series of descriptions of the victims and their encounters with the doctor. (A list in the back of characters and their roles is very helpful.) But again, there are glimpses of much more: the person who decided not to accept Petiot's 'help' because of his dirty hands, the villagers up in arms against/on behalf of Mayor Petiot, the family and acquaintances of Petiot who might have known early on of his murders.
But what makes the book not only solidly informative but delightful is Petiot's trial. I knew that I'd most likely skim the last 100 pages, the ones given over to the trial and including chunks of the transcript, because I always do resort to skimming that sort of thing. Not a bit of it. Farce, chaos, wittiness, unbelievable chutzpah, shouting, assault (Petiot actually threw exhibits of evidence at the clerk), boredom (naps were taken), loopy conspiracy theory as summation, uncontrolled crowds, confusion, autograph-hunting. At some point, it seems, everyone in the court seemed to recognise the absurdity of much of the trial and even the judges and lawyers found it difficult not to join in the laughter of the crowds. Absorbing and sometimes hilarious, and I'm grinning as I sit here remembering it.
If you're as appalled by this lack of decorum as by the murders, Unspeakable Crimes probably isn't the book for you.