lauren’s writing is excellent, but this work is structured too strangely for my taste. i admire the immense effort she put into this project. though i initially found her reconstruction of the victims’ final moments jarring, i think there was a lot of care put into humanizing them. however, the killer is also humanized through her correspondence and ongoing ‘friendship’ with him— which is not a bad thing per se, as all killers are ultimately human. but it was curious to feel their stories interwoven with court transcripts and lauren’s personal life. the structure of the book weakens the quality of the research and writing.