Rating: 
Summary: Convinced of his Guilt after the First Chapter
Review: Unlike other readers and the person who recommended this book, I was convinced of MacDonald's guilt from the first chapter. Having personal (and dreadful) experience with a pathological narcissist, Jeff MacDonald struck me as a liar, a cad, and an amoral narcissist with no conscience whatsoever. I don't necessarily buy the idea that he was psychotic as the result of amphetemines, but he had (has) the personality to snap and do something incredibly stupid and then try to cover it up. His gradiosity, sense of entitlement, lack of grief and ability to cry on cue was so eerie, it gave me the creeps just reading the things he said. This book kept me up for three or four nights until the wee hours and anyone interested in well-written true crime stories should not miss this book.Regardless of any "new" evidence, and the fact that the investigation was clearly fouled up, there is no doubt in my mind that Jeff was the killer. Maybe he didn't intend to kill anyone, but he did, nevertheless. I hope he never gets out.
Rating:
Summary: One of the classics of the true crime genre
Review: This is one of the most sobering of true crime tales, and one of the most intriguing. Former Green Beret officer Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald (still in prison last time I checked) called the police early one morning to report that his pregnant wife and two young daughters had been murdered by a marauding gang of hippies shouting "Kill the pigs, acid is groovy" while he received some superficial wounds trying to fight them off. Joe McGinniss who at the time was best known for his Nixon campaign book (The Selling of the President 1968) jumped on the case and made arrangements with MacDonald to follow him around and interview him. McGinniss has said that initially he believed MacDonald was innocent, but as he grew to know MacDonald, and as he sifted through the evidence he began to change his mind until in the end he believed along with the prosecution and the jurors that MacDonald had murdered his family. McGinniss reports all this in such a compelling manner that the reader is lead step by step to the same horrific conclusion (or at least most readers are). Also changing their minds about MacDonald were the wife's parents who at first refused to believe that he could have done something like this. Yet in the end they too were convinced. Not convinced however were MacDonald's many supports including as I recall members of the Long Beach, California police department, many of MacDonald's co-workers, and a number of women who found the doctor very attractive. All of this is interesting but what I think most fascinated McGinniss and what most fascinates me is an answer to the questions of Why did he do it? and How could any human being do something like that? The most plausible theory (this is basically McGinniss's theory as well) to explain why he did it goes something like this: In a rage (possibly induced in part by amphetamine use) MacDonald badly or fatally injured one of his family. Rather than own up to this and face the consequences he had the "fatal vision" (thought to have been conjured up in part from an Esquire Magazine article or in remembrance of the Mason family murders) of acid-crazed hippies breaking into his home and attacking his family with him in heroic defense. To make this work he would have to kill everybody except himself and construct a crime scene that would support his story. The prosecution and McGinniss careful show how MacDonald's crime scene construction failed. Readers interested in forensic science will find this aspect of the book absolutely fascinating, even if not entirely convincing. But to convict a man of murdering his family based on circumstantial evidence especially when the motive is not another woman, or money, but is instead merely a desire to hide what at worse would be manslaughter, seems quite a stretch for any jury, or so MacDonald apparently figured. But what went wrong was not only the evidence, but his personality. As McGinniss spent time with MacDonald he came to realize that Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald was not like other people. He was charming and very bright but there was a cold aspect to his personality, what in autism is called a "lack of affect." Obviously he was not autistic, or perhaps his is a form of autism. Anyway, according to the current psychiatric wisdom, such a person is called a psychopath or a sociopath. The words mean approximately the same thing, that is, a person who values only his or her own life and welfare, a person who has no real feelings of warmth for others, a person who has no compunction about taking the life of another if he or she can gain from it and get away with it. The compelling psychological argument for me (and perhaps for the jury that convicted him) is that ONLY such a husband and father could have done that. The fact that he fit the psychopathic personality type was what led to his conviction as much as the forensic evidence. I should add that even though over the years there have been tips about, and bizarre manifestations of, possible hippy suspects, MacDonald has remained the only real suspect. But did he do it? This book makes a powerful case that he did. Followers of sensational crimes such as the Jon Benet Ramsey case or the current case of Scott Peterson (reported as "laughing and joking" with his attorneys in court today as I write this) will see similarities here. In the Jon Benet case there is the sense of an attempt to cover up some violence inflicted on a member of the family because somebody (probably the mother) lost her temper, while in the Scott Peterson case there is the phenomenon of the sociopathic personality to explain an otherwise unthinkable crime. I originally thought that MacDonald was guilty and I still do, but I admit there is some doubt. Whether that doubt is "reasonable" is for you to decide. The jury has already decided. Someday there may be another trial. If so, that jury will decide. You might also want to read the "answer" to this book, Fatal Justice: Reinvestigating the MacDonald Murders (1992) by Jerry Allen Potter. Or go to the various Websites. I think you'll discover, as I did, why we have trials by jury in which both sides present their arguments. Just hearing one side seems so convincing until you hear the other side. Bottom line: one of the very best true crime reads, the book that made McGinniss's career and helped to end MacDonald's: one of the classics of the genre.
Rating: 
Summary: Terrible, Not factual at all
Review: If I could have given this book a -5 star rating I would have. This book is nothing but garbage. Please visit Court TV's web site and go to the Crime Library - Not Guilty? section and read the unbiased report that Court TV presents. Then come back here and buy Fatal Justice instead.
Rating:
Summary: This is the book that got me hooked on True Crime
Review: Utterly compelling, Fatal Vision is one of the top five all-time masterpieces of the "True Crime" genre. (Only Truman Capote and Ann Rule are capable of giving McGinnis a run for his money as masters of this genre.) I read it years before the "Fatal Justice" controversy, and since then have read practically every notable True Crime novel out there, examining all different types of cases. I remain convinced of MacDonald's guilt. Why? His case parellels too many other "family-murder" style crimes I've read about. Amateur criminals tend to think they are being very clever when they do things like inflict wounds on themselves and then invent tales of an attack by "bushy haired strangers" and "drug-crazed hippies." Actually, they are just doing the same things that numerous others have done before them -- and the authorities know it. Jeff MacDonald's case very closely and creepily resembles those of Diane Downs and Darlie Routier (women convicted of murdering their children). In all three instances, the lone "surviving witness" of the family massacre had suspicious, minor wounds that were most likely self-inflicted, while their victims suffered massive trauma. In all three instances, the "surviving witnesses" claimed that they and their families were attacked by "mysterious", crazed strangers of whom no real trace could be found. In all three instances, the "surviving witnesses" displayed peculiar emotional affects inconsistent with grief. In all three instances, the "surviving witnesses" were physically attractive, manipulative narcissists who had problems with empathy. The list of similarities goes on and on from there.
Rating: 
Summary: Biggest murder mystery of our time
Review: After reading Fatal Vision it was clear to me that this might be the best description of a murder mystery in all of history. I had seen the movie and determined that he was guilty...but Joe McGinniss delves into much more in the book than the movie portrayed. From chapter to chapter I reeled back and forth between guilty and not guilty. Why would this man who had everything going for him kill his pregnant wife and two young daughters? What motive could he possibly have? And yet there was no indication that anyone else was in the house the night of the murders. Thousands of people were questioned and the leads went nowhere. I also had to consider the botched investigation...people in the house who shouldn't have been, missing pieces of evidence, etc. When you add all of this up, it's the recipe for one of the most exciting mysteries, and it's all real! I have also seen Dr. MacDonald portrayed on American Justice and Mugshots. To this day I still cannot decide if he's guilty. If you want to read a truly intriguing mystery by all accounts of the word, this is the book to read.
Rating:
Summary: The Guy Did It. Period.
Review: Certainly it's valid to question whether the legal aspects of this case were conducted properly, whether the government behaved inappropriately or incompetently, and/or whether the prosecutors actually proved to a jury the defendant's guilt beyond reasonable doubt. However, it's also valid to observe that the guy did it -- he murdered his wife and two children, he was a sociopathic, drug-stimulated monster who lost his temper one night and killed them all. Fortunately for society, the chips fell against the killer in this case (unlike that episode in Brentwood), and he is in prison for life. Good.
Rating:
Summary: clear , though sensational, vision
Review: a compelling, stirring account of a megalomaniac gone awry. And I mean the subject - not the author. The author comes across as very believable in that he started out an avid supporter of the defendant and then, after a methodical review of the case and the subject's bizarre behavior, forms the intelligent opinion that MacDonald was the maniacal, homicidal one who did in fact kill his family. I know the author is sensational and has aroused much controversy with several of his books; but I think he got this one dead right! Follow up with your own independent reviews of other sources and I think you, too, shall be convinced that this was one doctor not to be trusted!
Rating:
Summary: Inspires passionate debate, on both sides.
Review: I've been studying the Jeffrey MacDonald case since reading FATAL VISION for a college journalism class in 1991, and more recently I've become more interested in the phenomenon surrounding the case than the case itself. Specifically, the white-hot passion exerted by detractors and supporters alike, both firmly entrenched in their respective beliefs regarding MacDonald's guilt or innocence. Many of these individuals seem not only thoroughly convinced, but react with strong negative emotion to arguments postulated by the other side. The venom and vitriol that spews back and forth between camps is a wonder to behold, and begs two questions: what is it about this case that makes it so polarizing, and why do people who are interested in it take such a vociferous stand on their conclusion, whichever it may be? FATAL VISION is a damning portrait of a narcissistic, psychopathic murderer slaughtering his family in a blind rage and making up a ludicrous story in order to get away with it. FATAL JUSTICE is a meticulous account of prosecutorial malfeasance of the highest order. Each book is convincing in its own way. Both arguments have merit. Both sides in this case snipe viciously at each other with vastly different interpretations of the same evidence; what is meaningful and damning to one side is "irrelevant" or "nonsense" to the other; what one side believes is real or crucial evidence, the other believes is false or meaningless evidence; where witnesses or participants have said different things at different times, each side believes the person was telling the truth in the instance that suits its position, and lying the other time. Both sides make false, exaggerated, or presumptuous claims to support their arguments, and claim their interpretation is the "ONLY way to see it;" the "ONLY logical conclusion." They refer to the other side and its arguments as "stupid," "ignorant," "ridiculous," "absurd," "cockamamie," "misguided," "biased," "brainwashed," "blind," "incredible," "startling," "delusional;" call each other "fools," "zealots," "idiots," "true-believers." Why all this passion? It seems as if the folks on both sides have some sort of personal stake in MacDonald's culpability; something to gain by his being guilty or innocent of the crimes. Very few cases inspire such vitriolic advocacy on BOTH sides. Detractors seem to feel that MacDonald is guilty because he was found so by the trial jury, and in turn because his account was not, and is not, believed or supported by the physical evidence. Supporters seem to feel that MacDonald is innocent because of the aforementioned chicanery on the part of the prosecutors, who knowingly suppressed evidence that DID support his account. Both sides can and will argue forever about this and never agree, because they interpret the same evidence in different ways. But it occurs to me that MacDonald was NEVER, EVER in the history of this case, afforded the presumption of innocence that is required for criminal defendants in this country. Not since those first moments when Mr. Ivory didn't like what he saw in the apartment after MacDonald was wheeled out on the gurney, and decided immediately, before testing any evidence or interviewing any witnesses, that MacDonald was lying and therefore guilty. No effort was ever made to prove MacDonald's account, only to DISPROVE it. As a point of logic, you can't prove a negative, i.e., you can't prove that something DIDN'T happen. The only way to prove a negative is to prove an incompatible positive; to prove something DID happen which nullifies the other possibility. This is why MacDonald was found innocent by the Army in 1970, and guilty by the jury in 1979. Disbelief in, or lack of evidence supporting, MacDonald's story DOES NOT make him guilty. Prosecutorial misconduct and/or suppression of evidence in this case DOES NOT make him innocent. Here's a suggestion for all the MacDonald debaters out there: Go back to the beginning. Forget everything you know and everything you've read about this case and return to the rainy morning of February 17, 1970. Start over, and this time consider everything we know now, not just what was known at trial in 1979, in the pages of FATAL VISION in 1983, and FATAL JUSTICE in 1995. Give MacDonald the presumption of innocence he never got in this case. You want to convict him? You can't do it by disproving his story; you have to actually prove that he did it. You want to acquit him? You can't prove that he didn't do it; you have to prove that someone else (or others) did. Good luck.
Rating:
Summary: A fabulous read
Review: Joe McGinniss has done a masterful job of breaking down a complex and confusing crime scene and walking the reader through it in a style that is simultaneously horrifying and can't-make-yourself-look-away compelling. Conversely, in his portrayal of Jeffrey McDonald, McGinnis has stepped to the side a bit and allowed McDonald to present himself as he truly is, a narcissist totally unaware of and blind to his own psychosis. I found this portrait particularly fascinating as it accurately reflected the attitudes and behaviors of one of my own family members who is serving a 231-year prison term for a series of violent crimes, which he swears he didn't commit.
Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Review: As an avid reader of true crime it never ceases to amaze me the impact that psychopaths continue to have on both the dead and surviving victims. Anyone who encountered Jeff Macdonald was left with lasting emotional turmoil. The only one that continues to seem inaffected is the murderer himself. This book is excellent captures this aspect perfectly. It is well written and researched. The only reason that I did not give it 5 stars is because there are a couple of brief periods that drag a bit, however, they are necessary to understanding the story.
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