Face to Face with Evil: Conversations with Ian Brady
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Product Description
Ian Brady is one of the most notorious and reviled serial killers in Britain. With his co-conspirator, Myra Hindley, he perpetrated the Moors Murders in which five children were abducted, assaulted and murdered. Dr Chris Cowley is a forensic psychologist who is in the unique position of having exclusive access to Brady. For six years, he has been conducting groundbreaking research by corresponding with and visiting him in prison. By gaining his trust, Cowley has been able to take an unrivalled look inside the mind of a serial killer. This important study provides information that will prove essential in our understanding of the psychology of serial killers. By broadening our knowledge of these complex issues, we can increase the likelihood of catching murderers and perhaps evern prevent their terrible crimes from taking place.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
33 of 35 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This has to be the most misleading book title ever.
As every other reviewer has said, it is not the inside story of Ian Brady, gleaned from extensive insider interviews. Rather, it is a few quotes from him presented in a sycophantic way by the author who, for some bizarre reason, seems to revere the monster.
The vast majority of the book is pseudo psychological babble about American serial killers, almost all of which is well known by anyone interested in true crime.
At one point in the book, Cowley talks about American killers Ted Bundy and Gerard Schaefer and says that because they're both dead, anyone examining their crimes has "only scraps to work with". This should be the title of Cowley's book because scraps are clearly all he's had to base it on. To be honest, part of me admires the guy for managing to get 290 pages out of what must be only a few sides of A4 worth of new material from Brady.
Another part of the book that particularly jarred with me - there are many - was when he suggested that if Brady was willing to admit to being a serial killer, it meant anything he said about his dreadful treatment at Ashworth secure hospital must be true. Of course, anyone who knows anything about Brady knows that he'll say what he can to undermine the authorities that keep him behind bars. Cowley acknowledges that Brady plays the system yet he contradicts himself. This kind of contradiction is a theme that runs throughout the book.
I'd also like to agree with an earlier reviewer who was appalled that the author refers to Lesley Ann Downey by her surname. Terribly disrespectful. If you write another book, Dr Cowley, please have the good grace to call victims by either their full name or first name.
There are too many things wrong, irritating, annoying and upsetting about this book to list. All I can say is that whoever edited it must care little for their trade.
The publisher will no doubt make a few quid from us mugs who bought it on account of the title and cover blurb. But they'll get no sales from word of mouth because anyone who's read it will tell all their friends that it's rubbish.
As every other reviewer has said, it is not the inside story of Ian Brady, gleaned from extensive insider interviews. Rather, it is a few quotes from him presented in a sycophantic way by the author who, for some bizarre reason, seems to revere the monster.
The vast majority of the book is pseudo psychological babble about American serial killers, almost all of which is well known by anyone interested in true crime.
At one point in the book, Cowley talks about American killers Ted Bundy and Gerard Schaefer and says that because they're both dead, anyone examining their crimes has "only scraps to work with". This should be the title of Cowley's book because scraps are clearly all he's had to base it on. To be honest, part of me admires the guy for managing to get 290 pages out of what must be only a few sides of A4 worth of new material from Brady.
Another part of the book that particularly jarred with me - there are many - was when he suggested that if Brady was willing to admit to being a serial killer, it meant anything he said about his dreadful treatment at Ashworth secure hospital must be true. Of course, anyone who knows anything about Brady knows that he'll say what he can to undermine the authorities that keep him behind bars. Cowley acknowledges that Brady plays the system yet he contradicts himself. This kind of contradiction is a theme that runs throughout the book.
I'd also like to agree with an earlier reviewer who was appalled that the author refers to Lesley Ann Downey by her surname. Terribly disrespectful. If you write another book, Dr Cowley, please have the good grace to call victims by either their full name or first name.
There are too many things wrong, irritating, annoying and upsetting about this book to list. All I can say is that whoever edited it must care little for their trade.
The publisher will no doubt make a few quid from us mugs who bought it on account of the title and cover blurb. But they'll get no sales from word of mouth because anyone who's read it will tell all their friends that it's rubbish.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
After reading the reviews here I was determined to try to find as much of value in this book as I could.
The author is clearly writing from an anti-capital punishment/pro-penal reform/humanitarian viewpoint, and that's fine by me. It is also not the task of books like this to declare antipathy towards the killer and empathy towards the victims - present the facts and let the reader decide.
But after this it's downhill all the way.
Is the title misleading? Yes. "Face to Face With Evil" - too sensationalist and the author never states that Brady is evil - when the question is asked in the book the author leaves it to the reader to decide, as it should be. "Conversations With Ian Brady" - this gives me the impression that most of the book will be transcripts of conversations, and it isn't. Conversations are referenced and there are many quotes from Brady, but most of the book is about the psychology and profiling of serial killing and the penal system of the UK, and the author and publisher missed a trick (as well as antagonising the readers) by the bad title choice.
The book seemed to me to be poorly structured, with sections injected into chapters where they just didn't seem to belong, possibly because no other place for them could be found. The writing style varies too much too - from the glib to the academic - with a smattering of sloppy grammar and repetition thrown in for good measure.
But worse, so much worse, is the plethora of unforgivable factual errors. Just taking references to Ted Bundy, for example, about 80% of what is written about him in this book is wide of the mark - from unsubstantiated or discredited hypotheses presented as fact right through to complete factual missers. There are too many to list, but just a couple of examples: Page 65: "... and on one occasion attacked five women in one night, three of them ending up dead.", Two, actually, Margaret Bowman and Lisa Levy. Page 161: "He was convicted of 30 murders, ...". He was convicted of just three murders: Bowman, Levy and Diane Leach. And so on. Though these errors do not affect the thrust of the arguments, they are incredibly sloppy and have no place in a serious work like this. They set my teeth on edge and made me doubt every fact presented on every topic.
I tried to find the good in this book. It has some good, but it's not good enough.
The author is clearly writing from an anti-capital punishment/pro-penal reform/humanitarian viewpoint, and that's fine by me. It is also not the task of books like this to declare antipathy towards the killer and empathy towards the victims - present the facts and let the reader decide.
But after this it's downhill all the way.
Is the title misleading? Yes. "Face to Face With Evil" - too sensationalist and the author never states that Brady is evil - when the question is asked in the book the author leaves it to the reader to decide, as it should be. "Conversations With Ian Brady" - this gives me the impression that most of the book will be transcripts of conversations, and it isn't. Conversations are referenced and there are many quotes from Brady, but most of the book is about the psychology and profiling of serial killing and the penal system of the UK, and the author and publisher missed a trick (as well as antagonising the readers) by the bad title choice.
The book seemed to me to be poorly structured, with sections injected into chapters where they just didn't seem to belong, possibly because no other place for them could be found. The writing style varies too much too - from the glib to the academic - with a smattering of sloppy grammar and repetition thrown in for good measure.
But worse, so much worse, is the plethora of unforgivable factual errors. Just taking references to Ted Bundy, for example, about 80% of what is written about him in this book is wide of the mark - from unsubstantiated or discredited hypotheses presented as fact right through to complete factual missers. There are too many to list, but just a couple of examples: Page 65: "... and on one occasion attacked five women in one night, three of them ending up dead.", Two, actually, Margaret Bowman and Lisa Levy. Page 161: "He was convicted of 30 murders, ...". He was convicted of just three murders: Bowman, Levy and Diane Leach. And so on. Though these errors do not affect the thrust of the arguments, they are incredibly sloppy and have no place in a serious work like this. They set my teeth on edge and made me doubt every fact presented on every topic.
I tried to find the good in this book. It has some good, but it's not good enough.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I picked this book up cheap and still felt cheated. As others have said the book boils down to a few very limited meetings with Brady. He gives nothing away and never will. The good doctor pads the rest out with random bits of American drivel and rants about the Police and the authorities that keep Brady locked up. His arguments are flawed and even worse, the book lacks structure and is badly written.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Face To Face With Evil
I thought this might be a learned tome which would lend insight into the psyche of Ian Brady. Instead, it's a shallow, peurile and extremely poorly written 'biog'. Read more
Published 28 days ago by Casandra
Face to Face With Evil: Conversations with Ian Brady
Though I found this book an interesting read, I have to agree with some of the previous comments. I should think most people bought this book because they wanted to know why the... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Wendy Kirby
Fails to deliver
This book claims to be "in-depth and revealing" and the prominant picture of Brady on the cover suggests that he is indeed the main feature. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Speedster
Rubbish
Just finished reading this tripe and I really doubt if the author or should I say compilier is a real "Dr" at all ! Read more
Published 6 months ago by M J BAKER
excellent insight into criminal psychology.
I came to this book after reading Carol Ann Lee's excellent biography of Myra Hindley (one of our own) just to get a balanced idea as to why they committed such awful crimes, and... Read more
Published 7 months ago by J R Hudson
A really interesting book with some well founded and thoughtful...
I was interested to see other people's views of this book after recently finishing it. People's main bugbears seem to be due to the fact the book is not infact completely about... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Belphoebe New
Cold Psychology Meets Cold Killer
Dr Cowley's interviews with infamous serial child-killer Brady (now in his 70s and probably looking an awful lot different than he does on the front cover) are worth reading if... Read more
Published 9 months ago by Green Man Music
interesting and insightful
i thoroughly enjoyed this book and found it extremely informative and insightful. I am a psychology student and feel it covered a lot of what i have learnt in my studies. Read more
Published 10 months ago by m
Interesting read
Aswell as conversations with Brady, the author also gives insights into other serial killers. I personally found it a very interesting read.
Published 10 months ago by J
Insight
An excellent read. Brady is now an old man, probably looks so harmless yet we know what he is capable of. Read more
Published 11 months ago by whd
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