Rating: 
Summary: GOOD TRY!
Review: IT WOULD BE STUPID TO GO INTO READING THIS BOOK THINKING THAT SHE HAS ACTUALLY SOLVED SUCH AN OLD CASE. I READ THIS BOOK BECAUSE OF THE SUBJECT AND I WAS CURIOUS IN WHAT SHE HAD TO SAY. A LITTLE MORE THAN HALF WAY THROUGH I GOT THE DISTINCT IMPRESSION THAT IT WAS LIKE READING A STUDENTS RESEARCH PAPER THAT THEY TRIED TO BS THEIR WAY THROUGH.I CAN'T GO INTO SUCH ELABORATE DETAIL AS SOME OF THE OTHER REVIEWERS, BUT SOME OF THE INFORMATION THAT SHE SHARED IN THE BOOK WAS VERY INTERESTING READING. IT WAS THE FIRST TIME I HAVE EVER READ THE ACCOUNTS OF ALL THE MURDERS COMMITTED BY THE RIPPER; EVEN THE ONES THAT WERE NOT REALLY LINKED TO HIM BUT PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE BEEN. I WAS DISAPPOINTED IN THE "EVIDENCE" THAT SHE SUPPOSEDLY FOUND AGAINST SICKERT AS BEING JACK THE RIPPER(WHAT EVIDENCE THERE WAS ANYWAY). THE WHOLE SECTION ON THE WATERMARKS WAS SO LONG AND CONFUSING THAT I DEBATED SKIPPING THE SECTION A FEW TIMES. THE TESTING OF THE DNA EVIDENCE THAT MIGHT HAVE ACTUALLY POINTED TO SICKERT AS THE RIPPER IS NOT EVEN COMPLETED. AS FAR AS "READING INTO" HIS PAINTINGS, AT TIMES IT FELT LIKE SHE WAS REACHING FOR SOMETHING TO BRING SICKERT FURTHER AND FURTHER INTO THE LIGHT WHEN SOMETHING LIKE CRITIQUING HIS ART DOES NOT NECESSARILY PROVE THAT HE WAS THE RIPPER. THE ONLY TRUE AND HONEST POINT THAT WAS MADE IN THIS BOOK WAS THE QUOTE BY ONE OF HER COLLEAGUES THAT "CALLING A COINCIDENCE AFTER A COINCIDENCE A COINCIDENCE IS JUST PLAIN STUPID". SURE YOU CAN GO WITH YOUR GUT FEELING AFTER READING ABOUT SICKERTS LIFE, HIS PAINTINGS, AND EVEN HIS ABNORMAL BODY PARTS AND PROBABLY COME OUT RIGHT ON THE MARK, BUT SHE OF PEOPLE SHOULD KNOW THAT'S NOT HOW THE SYSTEM WORKS. MAYBE DURING THAT TIME IF THEY HAD EVEN HALF OF THIS INFORMATION I'M SURE THAT SCOTLAND YARD WOULD CONSIDER SICKERT A PRIME SUSPECT, BUT WE'LL NEVER KNOW. I'M NOT SO SURE I WOULD HAVE SPENT SO MUCH MONEY ON RESEARCHING AND PUBLISHING SOMETHING SO INCONCLUSIVE. I'M STILL A BIG FAN AND NOT TOO DISAPPOINTED THAT I HAVE ADDED THIS BOOK TO MY COLLECTION.
Rating: 
Summary: It was okay
Review: Somehow I expected more. Not that Ms Cornwell didn't put forth some convincing evidence, but the manner in which she rambled from topic to topic to topic and back again, and the defensive tone of some of her arguments bothered me. I found the narrative hard to follow at times, as it bounced from modern DNA testing to Sickert's personality flaws to watermarks on stationery and so on. It's true that writing convincing non-fiction and gripping fiction are two very different talents. Worth a read, but has its tedious moments.
Rating: 
Summary: A terrible book
Review: Do not read this book if you want reliable information on the ripper case. As the CASEBOOK website on the ripper crimes argues, there is much wrong with Cornwell's evidence and her use of it. For example, she ignores evidence that her suspect Sickert was in France during the commission of several ripper crimes. She also provides absolutely no evidence that Sickert had violent tendencies or ever had any residence or spent any time in the area of the killings. Her emphasis on the ripper letters is largely useless, since there is no way to determine their authenticity. The preimier book on the ripper is Philip Sugden's THE COMPLETE HISTORY OF JACK THE RIPPER. A trained historian, Sugden explores the vast evidence meticulously. It is really THE book to read on the ripper case.
Rating:
Summary: George Gissing was the Ripper
Review: Actually, Jack the Ripper was the late Victorian novelist, George Gissing, author of New Grub Street -- at least Gissing is as credible a culpert as Sickert when applying the same type of "evidence" and "logic" as Cornwell offers in her sophomoric excuse of a book. After all, Gissing caught a venereal disease and endured social disgrace and great poverty as a result of his affair with the prostitute, "Nell." Certainly a reason for this shy-spoken and self-effacing classical scholar and realist novelist to harbor a deep-seated homcidal rage against all prositutes and to revenge himself by serial murders in the East End. And here's the clincher: within six months of Nell's death in 1888, while Gissing was living in London, the first of the Ripper murders was committed! Notice also that the Ripper murders abruptly had ended by the time Gissing had moved to France in the 1890s. Case closed, eh? Or perhaps the Ripper was Jude Fawley, the main character of Thomas Hardy's novel, Jude the Obscure, who was given in its pages to drunken acts of self-destruction, or then again perhaps the Ripper was none other than General Charles "Chinese" Gordon -- four years after Gordon's mysterious "beheading" and "disappearance" at Khartoum the near-decapitation murders of East End prostitutes begin.
My point is that this sort of speculation can go on forever, as Cornwell's seemingly intermittable book does, and anyone could write this type of god-awful speculation, even without the temptations of a millions-dollar advance, if only one "would abandon one's mind to it."
Rating:
Summary: First and last time.
Review: I've read many of the reviews already posted here, and there isn't much more I can add. This is the first Cornwell book I have read, and it will likely be the last. As a former police officer, I was always told to be careful "not to make the evidence fit the suspect". Cornwell seems to draw as much from her imagination as from the facts. Did she research other suspects as thoroughly as Sickert or did she mold her evidence to suit her literary needs? I found the book poorly written and badly edited.I'm glad I waited to borrow it from the library and did not spend money on it.
Rating:
Summary: Disjointed and Unconvincing
Review: Ms. Cornwell's thesis is unconvincing and poorly organized. Her prose, much like the Ripper's victims themselves, is in many places mutilated. I was very disappointed, as I enjoy her Kay Scarpetta books and found them to be vastly more coherent and readable. One quite perplexing decision: Many of Mr. Sickert's paintings that Ms. Cornwell refers to are not reproduced in the book, but instead many illustrations and photographs which have only peripheral connection to her argument are reproduced instead (for example, pictures of other suspects that she only spends a paragraph or so talking about). Ms. Cornwell relies heavily on psychological profiliing of Mr. Sickert -- and uses a jury litmus test -- except that it is highly unlikely a reasonable jury would convict since most of her argument is supposition and conjecture, and her DNA evidence is lacking. Also troubling is the fact that Ms. Cornwell does not provide any in-text citations, endnotes, or footnotes to support her argument - instead relying on a "Works Cited" section at the end of the document. Although I don't believe she was purposely being academically dishonest, I do find it hard to take this book seriously as scholarly research. She also never establishes her "experts" credentials - they could just be lackeys on her payroll for all we know.
Rating:
Summary: Slightly disorienting, with no firm conclusion...
Review: I've read quite a few books about Jack the Ripper, and I was excited to read this book. However, I don't believe that the author has presented strong enough evidence to warrant the conclusion that she states. Granted, a lot of circumstantial evidence points to the suspect named in the book, but very little hard evidence is brought forward. Perhaps it is not possible to find anything but circumstantial evidence considering the crimes occurred over 110 years ago. Also, the book is presented in a somewhat confusing way, and is difficult, almost boring, to read. Very little attention is focused on the actual crimes. Instead, large tracts of the book are about the suspects supposed sexual dysfunctions. I was really looking forward to this book, but I was slightly disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: Patricia Cornwell needs to stick to writing novels
Review: While I found this book entertaining, I cannot say Patricia Cornwell convinced me of anything more than the fact that she should stick to writing her Kay Scarpetta series. I thought this book was all over the place--jumping from one thing to the next & then back again. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes to entertain all of the theories about who Jack the Ripper was, but I would never tell anyone I believe what she is selling here.
Rating:
Summary: Fact or Fiction
Review: I'm an avid reader of crime thrillers, so I know Patricia Cornwell well. Unfortunately, her latest attempt at non-fiction isn't as clearly organized as her thrillers. A few charts and timelines would help the reader understand all the murders she attributes to Sickert. As for objectivity, Cornwell misses the mark, since she only presents facts that support her theory. She could learn a thing or two about presenting the facts in an entertaining yet objective manner from investigative reporter Anthony Summers' who wrote "Goddess: The Secret Lives of Marilyn Monroe," an excellent and well-researched book regarding the assasination of Marilyn Monroe. However, if you want to better understand violent psychopathy and how forensic medicine is utilized, Cornwell does a wonderful job on both of these topics. Overall, not her best writing effort, but worth the read to understand the diseased psychopathic soul.
Rating: 
Summary: Good research... I think she done it.
Review: The tendency, of course, when trying to prove any theory is to talk endlessly about the circumstances that prove your case -- ignoring the ones that don't. Although there are exceptions, the majority of the time it does not appear to me that Cornwell is doing this.
Instead, it seems that she tries to cover all bases by comparing and constrasting evidence and theories. Conwell appears truly passionate about discovering the Ripper secrets as well as sustaining her reputation.
I believe that she would have insisted the project be abandoned -- rather than slyly salvaged -- had she found evidence that caused her case to fall. Theories others have proposed regarding the Ripper are discussed and, many times, shown to be false by constrasting evidence she has found.
Other theories seem validly disproven based on her personal conclusions. In my opinion she does not so much drive a "look I solved it" idea down your throat -- but instead passionately supports her theories with bits of fact, new evidence and well-thought out theories.
It seems clear that if this evidence had been presented to London Police in the Ripper's time -- Sickert would have been arrested and tried for many, if not all, of the murders. In addition to all the Ripper evidence and theories provided, Conwell paints a thorough and precise picture of London during the Ripper era. Through this information she puts the reader at at the scene of the crimes, and examines how people lived, the political structure, and medical conditions that affected the entire scheme of the Ripper investigation. Her theories, forensic knowledge, and storytelling techique all fuse together wonderfully to make a compelling read.
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