Murder USA, by Ken Rossignol

Book number 39 for 2023; 2/5 Goodreads stars

Okay. This book is a hot mess, and I think that’s being generous. The only reason I did not DNF this book was because of the entertainment value.

No, murder is not entertaining. But this author’s writing is. It’s entertaining because it’s so BAD!

Most of the chapters in this book are comprised of articles written for the author’s tabloid “newspaper,” called St. Mary’s Today (which is almost impossible to find online). It looks very similar to things like The National Enquirer and World News, or whatever those other tabloids are called.

The worst thing about this book is the editing and grammatical mistakes. There are sentences that don’t make sense, wrong verb tenses, and so on. In addition, there is scarcely a story in there that he doesn’t editorialize with his extreme bigoted opinion. He hates the police, he hates the sheriff’s department, he hates the criminals. Does he like anyone? I’m not sure.

Here’s an example of the bad editing, a dangling participle, I believe. “A conversion van then drove up to the store, which had driven into the parking lot from the direction of Clements on Rt. 234.” I’m pretty sure that the store did not drive into the parking lot.

Here’s one sentence that makes no sense: “But the Maryland authorities who allowed him out of a mental hospital and pronounced him sane, raped and murder Devine the same year he was released.”

And another: “The gun which was discovered nearby the store, if indeed it had been carried by Bowles as part of his break-in to the store, giving anyone in the store who saw an armed man breaking into the front door, sufficient cause to fire.”

There was one place where he described “woods and grass surrounding the lake” as “moving parts.”

Some of the stories are truly, in and of themselves, horrific tales of violence. It’s the way they are presented that just doesn’t satisfy. Some, however, are truly hilarious, because both the people committing the crime, as well as the victims, are terrible (and perhaps mentally challenged) human beings.

There are enough really good true crime books out there to not have to waste your time on this. I had another of this author’s books in my list, somewhere, and have subsequently deleted it.

TTFN, y’all!