Rating: 
Summary: Loved the beginning, couldn't stand the end
Review: At first I couldn't put this book down. I found the description of the lifestyles in Boulder fascinating.Then, about half way through, it got extremely repetitive and bogged down in the political and procedural nightmare of the case. I suppose that reflects the reality of the situation. Anyway, I couldn't stand it anymore and jumped over a lot of pages in the middle and end.
Rating: 
Summary: It clears up a lot of mis-conceptions.
Review: I have paid little attention to the media hype related to Jon-Benet's death. I initially thought because of the "public's reaction" to her murder, that there must be substantial evidence pointing to the parents' involvement in her death. It is because of this reaction that I decided to read Mr. Schiller's book. Yes, there is a lot of information to read in this book. A lot of background has been done on persons involved in the case: witnesses, suspects, law enforcement, journalists, etc. But all this background plays an important part in understanding why this is such a difficult case. What surprised me is all the supposed "overwhelming" evidence doesn't really point to anyone at this time. I feel the Boulder City Police Dept., media and general public rushed to a conclusion they are now unwilling to give up on, despite what the actual evidence is. This case may never bring about an arrest. I don't have any "gut feelings" about who may have did this horrible thing, but it is clear by Mr. Schiller's book that many facts about the case do not satisfactorily explain the scenarios concocted. We should be careful about ruining people's lives and reputations on supposition. It would be better to have this case unresolved than to ruin someone who may be innocent.
Rating:
Summary: insightful, but slow-going
Review: I read this book with my own suspicions in mind, but without having followed the case much in the tabloids. Schiller does a very good job, I think, of being totally unbiased, presenting the facts as they are, and letting the chips fall where they may. However, I found it somewhat difficult reading as oftentimes things were repeated, you thought the book was going in chronological order, but then something was thrown in out of order. The reader really feels the frustration of the Boulder police force as they try to contend with a DA who wants to ensure a "winnable case". The book left me feeling that my original thoughts on who killed Jon Benet were correct, but sadly that justice would not be done, and several people's careers were lost in the process. You also feel that had this family not been wealthy, the case would definitely been handled differently.
Rating:
Summary: COULD'VE BEEN BETTER
Review: I think the author wrote this book while in a white hot fury. There's nothing wrong with righteous indignation and this case cries out for that but he's so angry that he fails to present his case in a concise, linear way for his readers.
Rating:
Summary: A Fact Filled Good Read
Review: If you are interested in the JonBenet Ramsey murder case, this would be a good book to read for the facts. It's a good read and it capture's the reader's interest. If you want to be taken step-by-step through the investigation, this is the book for you.
It is a bit difficult to remember all the names. You may find yourself flipping back and saying to yourself, "now who is this guy again?"
One thing that occured to me as I read is that the investigators in the Boulder Police have an ego problem. They seem to not be open to an intruder theory.
I didn't really have a keen interest in this case until May 2001 when Lou Smit came on the Today show and discussed his intruder theory. Lou Smit seems to be very intelligent, thorough, and a true professional in his line of work. After watching him on the Today show, I bought Perfect Murder, Perfect Town. The Boulder PD spent too much time pointing their finger at the Ramsey's from the very beginning (not to mention botching the investigation).
What the police (and most of the public) are forgetting is that Patsy had survived cancer. I'm sure she had a renewed appreciation of life and her children--including negative things like bedwetting. Her flying into a rage over a bedwetting incident (as Steve Thomas thinks)is ridiculous. John Ramsey had already lost a child (he had books on how to cope). If he knew that Patsy did it, he would have turned her in and gotten a divorce in a heartbeat. Anybody who is a fan of Colombo, Murder She Wrote, etc., would be meticulous about wiping down fingerprints, and stage the scene from the beginning to look like it was someone else. Why would a potential kidnapper/murderer (especially one who would want to implicate the Ramsey's) drive to the house with an already drawn up note and rope etc.? What if he got pulled over by a traffic cop and his car searched? I think it was an intruder(but not a stranger, it was someone who knew them) that wanted to implicate the Ramsey's. That's why it looks like the Ramsey's did it, but there is no concrete evidence proving their guilt. If you want facts, this book is worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: The devil is in the details
Review: Schiller of Simpson trial fame, here does the same thorough and probing look at the Jon Benet Ramsey case. Looking at as much data and angles as he can, Schiller presents a case for the unusual combination of a perfectly staged murder coupled with a town's incapacity to investigate and prosecute a trial of this magnitude and national spotlight. Whether one agrees or not with the observations and data interpretation that the author reaches, reading this work does get one contemplating the case. Certainly one can challenge the data, process and Schiller's deductions and insights, but this does offer each reader the benefit of Schiller's massive undertaking and cataloguing of the case. I enjoyed this read.
Rating:
Summary: Good though too much
Review: Should have let the editor have another whack at this one, because at 800pgs (paperback) this is is one slow read. Worse, Schiller has a really annoying tendency to follow one aspect of the case right to the point where it gets interesting, then veer off onto something completely unrelated. Example: his discussion of the Vanity Fair piece, which is boring in the extreme. Or the description of the autopsy, which keeps getting interrupted to delve into non-issues. And all the quotes from Jeff Shapiro, a hack for The Globe. Ugh. Who cares what the hell Jeff Shapiro thinks? Padding, padding, padding. Schiller takes tabloid articles, newspaper stories, personal interviews, etc., and lards up his manuscript until you start skipping ahead to get to a part where anything is actually happening. Somewhere under all this extraneous garbage is an actual story. Schiller should have done us the favor of scraping it off and presenting it. As a 400pgs work, this thing would be a great inside view of the media circus surrounding the case. At 800pgs, it's a plodder. Do we really need to wade through all of Charlie Brennan's dull articles when we can see them in all their dreary entirety on the Rocky Mtn. News web site? And facts? Schiller apparently didn't check too many of them. Pg 606: "Four fibers had been found attached to the duct tape; they were red and black." Sorry, just red. And, of course, he faithfully trots out the old "no footprints in the snow" nonsense, when one look at the crime scene photos would have made it clear that the house could be approached without leaving any. This is what happens when you write a book based on nothing but tabloid bunk, inside "sources" like Steve Thomas who are feeding you lies, and interviews with non-players like the freaking gardener, whose pointless JonBenet story opens the book. I give it 2 stars because it depicts the sorry state of the case c. 1999, before we discovered that so much of the "evidence" against the Ramseys was either fanciful (Foster's ransom note analysis), irrelevant (that stupid pineapple) or just flat out wrong (all the stories about child abuse). But hey, at least Schiller didn't intentionally lie and get sued like Steve Thomas. Even if his writing style is garbage, he at least attempted to tell the truth as he saw it at that time. Too bad he never had an inside track and instead has to report on so many trivialities about media personalities.
Rating: 
Summary: A Puzzling Murder Intersects Human Frailties
Review: Some complain there are too many details in this book, but in real crime (as opposed to a Murder Mystery), the details (both present and missing) are part of the actual story. This book presents a lot of evidence. But at the same time this is the story of how the politics and clashing personalities has an effect on how a murder investigation proceeds. Reading this book is both a journey through the evidence and an insight into how the humanity of the police makes the results quite different then a collection of cyborg detectives might perform.
Rating:
Summary: The devil is in the details
Review: This book is a good case of "too much information". After 100 pages, I was thoroughly lost. The author introduces all of the many players in the death and suqbsequent murder investigation: family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, police, private investigators, DAs....even Santa Claus! Their relationships to the Ramseys and to each other in the investigation are all detailed up front, but I soon found myself unable to remember who was who when their name cropped up again 200 pages later. He should have put some type of legend up front listing all the caharacters and a one-line description of who they were, so that those of us without photographic memories could have a quick reference tool to aid us. Although the author is extremely thorough and he clearly didn't want to leave any detail out, he needed to tighten this up....a lot. A good, concise read containing only the most powerful information could have been accomplished in 400 or 500 pages;I found myself skimming the 798 pages, trying to root out the good stuff
Rating: 
Summary: too many names and law, not enough about JonBenet!
Review: This book is too focused on law and names. I couldnt keep the names straight, however there is a name index in the back, as well as the Ramseys Boulder home floor plans. Only one chapter is "devoted" to JonBenet.If you really want to read about JonBenet's life and death, read JonBenet by steve thomas.This book doesn't tell anything about JonBenet's life, and it definately doesn't keep her precious memory alive!
Although the movie/dvd was excellent, this book wasnt very good. I would not reccommend this book!
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