Rating: 
Summary: Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper, Case Closed
Review: The majority of the content in this book is uninteresting digressions about life in London at the time of the Ripper murders and about modern forensic techniques which had no relevance to the Ripper case since they didn't exist then. The "Case" that Ms. Cornwallis considers closed is built on flimsy innuendo. Notably, she feels qualified to diagnose her target, the painter Walter Sickert, as having a psychopathic personality based on scanty evidence largely consisting of examples of his not being nice to people or determines that he must be the killer since some aspects of some of his paintings "resemble" some aspects of some of the murder scenes. Still, I might could forgive some of that if the book weren't so incredibly dull. This might be her greatest achievement -- making one of the most fascinating murder-mysteries in history boring. This book cannot, of course, rival the gruesome murders it considers. Nonetheless, it is a crime of considerable magnitude.
Rating: 
Summary: Bad logic...
Review: Although Ms. Cornwell does provide much of the common data used by modern "Ripperologists" and provides a handful of new propositions, the book is fragmented and redundant in tone. Huge liberties are taken in her deductions and square pegs are forced into round holes more violently than the Ripper dealt deathblows. I imagine the only reason this book was released was to offset the losses she occurred in her obsessive and extravagant research of the case. IN SHORT: I would not recommend this as a Ripper primer, but only if you are interested in the greater span of Ripper theories.
Rating:
Summary: Cornwell the Ripper
Review: Ms. Cornwell rips apart Walter Sickert's reputation in an attempt to sell a book about Jack the Ripper. The only things that is made entirely clear in this book is that Ms. Cornwell really hates a dead artist named Walter Sickert and she has no proof that Sickert was Jack the Ripper. Apparently, it is not that difficult to pin a series of crimes on a dead man when one uses unreliable evidence. Ms. Cornwell does offer some interesting circumstantial evidence which makes me wish I could hear Sickert's side of the story. Or that there were any information about his location at the time of any of the crimes of which she accuses him. Or she had anything other than evidence that he may have written some letters signing them as Jack the Ripper. I hope she plans to return to righting full out fiction like the Scarpetta books and stays out of the historical fiction realm where she trys to be her character Kay Scarpetta.
Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable Overall
Review: After reading the reviews posted by others, I was suprised at the malice towards Cornwell. Anyone who expected this to be a tell-all about Jack the Ripper will be sorely disappointed. The evidence is over 100 years old, and much of it is missing. Did they expect anything new to come to light? Having said that, I would like to say that this is an enjoyable, well written piece of work. It brings to light new theories for anyone interested in Jack.
Rating: 
Summary: Truthful...Case Closed!
Review: Oh, please. I detest armchair critics, amateurs who purport to know more than the author of a well researched, and well written book. Ignore such wannabes, and read this book. Ms. Cornwell's expert, investigative, and convincing expose on Mr. Ripper, is one of THE MOST exhaustive of the many books on the subject. The problem is, people have such entrenched notions, and narrow minds when it comes to new information that might possibly render their "knowledge" obsolete. So, they write negative reviews like the ones above. They are wrong. Yes, this book may challenge every preconceived idea you have had about the killer, but truth doesn't really ask anyone's opinion. It is what it is, and this book is worth considering truthful. A job well done, Ms. Cornwell. Jack the Ripper would be proud.
Rating:
Summary: Case wide open
Review: While I have tremendously enjoyed the Kay Scarpetta series of Cornwell's, her attempt at real-life detective work and forensics in the Ripper case is probably heroic, but ultimately, unfulfilled. There is no denying that she has approached the Ripper riddle armed with the latest in forensic technology and has made a credible argument for Sickert. However, the case is far from closed. Cornwell's success with her body of fictional work lends credence to the title of the book, "Jack the Ripper Case Closed," but to say that the case is closed is misleading at best... Moreover, the book was far from a pleasant read, and not for reasons of blood and gore. Rather, poor grammar, tortured syntax, and lack of overall organization all combine with the oversold title to make this Ripper book a [bad choice].
Rating:
Summary: A novelist but not a historian
Review: It's almost redundent to add anything to the already vast pile of reviews from fans of Cornwell's fiction work that agree that this is attrocious bilge. Cornwell's fiction career points to the two problems that ripple through the existence of this book. Firstly, without the success of the Kay Scarpetta books, there would have been no way that a respectable publishing house would have published her theories on the true identity of Jack the Ripper. Secondly, as a novelist, she's used to re-shaping reality to create her story and putting the guilty party on the spot, leaps of logic not withstanding. When she tries to incriminate painter Walter Sickert as the killer, she has to ignore every single piece of evidence produced to date, most especially the fact that the London Police actually had a suspect at the time and lost him (a quack named Tumbletee, not an artist named Sickert). There is no evidence to point the finger at Sickert whatsoever, beyond some vastly mis-guided art interpretation. Basically, her theory comes down to the belief that Sickert must have been a killer because he painted killings. Since Cornwell writes about murders, is she telling us something about herself? Some clue to a butcherous little side-line? Of course not. This is 'research' on a par with that which concludes that the pyramids are lighthouses for UFOs. It's just the latest in a long line of cod-historical novels that have tried to claim that Jack must have been someone famous, like Royal Surgeon Sir Withey-Gull or prime minister Gladstone or even Queen Victoria herself. Avoid under all circumstances.
Rating:
Summary: Kudos for Cornwell
Review: I'm amazed at the number of negative reviews that readers have posted. The most common criticisms are that all the evidence Cornwell presents to connect the Ripper to Sickert is "circumstantial," and that the book is disorganized, and that it ends abruptly. Each of these criticisms is inaccurate. To begin with, the Ripper murders occurred over a century ago. Without a time machine and a video camera, all evidence discovered will be by its very nature circumstantial. Most criminals nowadays are convicted on circumstantial evidence. This being the case, Cornwell does an excellent job in presenting the common characteristics of serial killers in general and the Ripper in particular, and showing how Sickert's history and life-patterns overlap. As for being 'disorganized,' the book follows chronologically from the first to the last murders. The narrative often goes on tangents to flesh out the details of 19th Century London, but these are some of the chief pleasures of the book. Cornwell's research was exhaustive, and the fruits of that research are remarkably detailed and clearly presented. Lastly, the book does have an abrupt end, but this is merely because the conclusion -- the final summarization of evidence and what it all means -- is put at the beginning of the book. It is the first chapter, and provides a 'road map' for all that follows. This may strike some readers as unusual, but it is a device used for clarity in all legal writing, and is completely appropriate for a non-fiction work. In short, my wife and I truly enjoyed this book, and encourage all who are interested to read it. I would like to add that whether you agree with Cornwell's conclusions or not, she has done something that no one else has: switched the focus from the Ripper -- a cypher if ever there was one -- to his victims. Her sympathetic portrayal of the women who died so terribly is an admirable tribute to the victims, and a condemnation of the (often glorified) Victorian Age.
Rating:
Summary: Poorly edited, poorly written!
Review: Did this book have an editor? It is so jumbled, it's hard to read. In my view, Cornwell MAY have proven that Sickert wrote one or more of the Ripper letters, but does that make him the killer? Otherwise, she seems to read a lot into his "dark, violent" art work- so much so that it almost becomes laughable. Does every drawing or painting of a woman really look dead? I don't think so. What Cornwell proves is that Sickert was probably a sicko, but she really stretches and uses a lot of supposition to link him to the kiilings.
Aside from all that, the book is just plain poorly written- jumping from subject to subject with a few paragraphs thrown in that have nothing to do with the surrounding text.
This comes off as an unworthy vanity work by a successful novelist.
Rating: 
Summary: Reasonable doubt?
Review: I think the case was made that Walter Sickert wrote some, maybe all, of the "Ripper Letters", and that some of his paintings reflect the Ripper's handiwork. However, I think that a defense attorney could make a good argument that Sickert was just an "aficionado", a fan, a Rippermania groupie. Modern cases still attract such people, including those who "confess" to the crimes, as many of the Ripper letters did.
I agree with most other reviewers that the book needed more editing. What a shame to put all that work and money into research and then to rush (so it seems) the account into print. Perhaps she feared that the meat of the story would scooped by the news media.
I have read most of the theories on the identity of JTR, and hers is the most believable, but "case closed" is stretching it.
|
