Killing for Company
From AwardAnnals
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| Author(s) | Brian Masters |
|---|---|
| Subtitle | The Story of a Man Addicted to Murder |
| Publisher | Dell |
| Honors | |
| Over a period of four years, Dennis Nilsen brutally murdered 15 men. He kept them as companions, talking to them and dressing them; then he buried them under his floor or dismembered them and flushed them down the plumbing. Clogged pipes led authorities to uncover Nilsen’s gruesome madness—the largest case of mass murder in England’s history. | |
This book was also subtitled The Case of Dennis Nilsen.
Over a period of four years, Dennis Nilsen brutally murdered 15 men. He kept them as companions, talking to them and dressing them; then he buried them under his floor or dismembered them and flushed them down the plumbing. Clogged pipes led authorities to uncover Nilsen’s gruesome madness—the largest case of mass murder in England’s history.
Honors
Reviews
Amazon.com
This brilliant psychological study of British serial killer Dennis Nilsen was, writes the author, an “oddity,” because its subject was so “outlandish,” so unheard-of in the annals of psychiatry: “Until, that is, Jeffrey Dahmer was arrested…While in the immediate sense of personal impact Dahmer is unlike Nilsen, being diffident, quiet, polite, even a little dull, against Nilsen’s extrovert loquacity and self-confidence, their crimes bear such close similarities of method, manner, and, yes, motive, as to…mean that the Nilsen/Dahmer brand of florid necrophilia could at last be definable.” Brian Masters, better known for his literary and historical works, has written a classic of true crime—a penetrating exploration of not just the crimes, but also the mind of a serial killer. Especially fascinating are excerpts from Nilsen’s journals and a collection called “Sad Sketches: Monochrome Man” of drawings and handwritten prose and poetry about the victims. The book includes a postscript by a forensic psychiatrist and a bibliography.
