Like all of this lady's books, it ends

Deadly 'Heart'
Without question, Ann Rule is the high priestess of the true-crime genre. Those of us who are fascinated with the topic know that there's a lot of garbage sitting on shelves in this section of any bookstore. Rule rarely disappoints. She writes two types of true-crime books these days, usually one long book-length case every year or so, and also a new volume in her True Crime Files, which collects short takes on numerous cases. The True Crime Files are a good appetizer, but it's the book-long cases that are the meaty main course.

Rule's latest book-length case, "Heart Full of Lies: A True Story of Desire and Death" (Free Press, $26), tackles the murder of Chris Northon, a Hawaiian Airlines pilot who was found dead in his sleeping bag at an Oregon campsite. His wife Liysa admitted to taking his life, but claims she was forced to it by her husband's abuse. Yet Liysa's life is tangled with contradictions and lies, and no one else who knew him can imagine Chris Northon raising a hand to anyone.

It's the kind of case Rule does best -- murderer and victim are family, not strangers. The alleged murderer led a complicated emotional life -- putting forth a front to the world that didn't match what was really going on. People talk to Rule, and as a former Seattle police officer, she's able to separate truth from fiction. If there's a flaw in this book and in many of her book-length cases, it's an inability to paint victims as anything but faultless saints. I'm not suggesting that Northon was in any way to blame in this case, but he's portrayed as a kind of Mother Teresa of the Skies. It's a bit jolting, considering how deeply Rule delves into Liysa's character.

That said, as long as Rule keeps writing, there'll be life in the intriguing yet controversial true-crime genre yet. Nobody does it better. —G.F.C.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3658938/ ( )

Former Seattle police officer and crime author Rule (Small Sacrifices; Dead by Sunset, etc.) knows a good drama when she finds one: it involves love, betrayal, greed and violence. In the story of Liysa Northon, a woman who murdered her third husband, Chris Northon, in order to collect his insurance money, Rule has found a real-life soap opera. In the fall of 2000, Liysa convinced Chris to go on a camping trip with her and their small son in the remote forests of Oregon. But the idyllic vacation didn't last long; Liysa would later admit to ending her husband's life by shooting him in the head in an act of "self-defense." From where she sits today (in an Oregon state prison), she still professes to have shot Chris only in innocence and fear-emotions she said were caused by her years as a victim of domestic violence. But according to her husband's parents and other sources, Liysa is a manipulative sociopath who spent years crafting a public façade of abuse persuasive enough to justify the cold-blooded murder of her husband. Rule has done an impressive amount of research to reconstruct the history of Liysa's crime and the stories of the main people involved, interviewing dozens of police officers, investigators and private citizens across the country. And if the author's prose is somewhat flat, the fascinating and perplexing drama should be more than enough to keep most readers turning pages.

like a lifetime movie in a book. i love ann rules true crime. i love tales of crazy murderous women.