From the first few pages, I was hooked. This stuff is just so fascinating to me. When you read this book, you are getting several decades worth of experience from one of the top FBI agents in the world of criminal profiling.

After reading this book, I must say that I will see something on the news and think about what was said in this book. The author does a good job of laying out what type of people are most likely to engage in things like rape, murder, arson, bomb making, etc. Through years and years of interviews with everyone from average convicts to famous serial killers, the author has found certain similarities in the types of people who commit some of these awful crimes. He freely admits that he can't be 100% accurate on every case, but most of the people who commit certain acts can be labeled and categorized based on what occurred in the commission of the crime with relative accuracy. The incident in Scotland when the book begins is a good example of this.

One example of something I picked up from the book that is worth noting:

Arson - When a place of residence goes up in flames and nobody is hurt, the first thing to look for are personal items that cannot be replaced, such as photographs. If those were removed before the fire, look to the home owners for a possible insurance motive.

There are plenty of other things that I picked up as well. Mainly, that there are certain commonalities among the people who commit crimes like arson, mass murder, bomb making, etc. Most people would probably agree that all types of crimes have similarities, but how many of us know what those are? How many people know what the difference between a person with 2 stab wounds and 20 stab wounds is? What about the difference between a body that is posed or covered up versus one that isn't? These questions and more are tackled by the author with great detail.

If I could say one thing in regards to this book it is that the author is not speaking from the point of view of a years worth of library research. He didn't read a bunch of case files and try and extrapolate the psycho-babble from the case notes. He actually talked to a lot of very bad people face to face. He played on their egos and personalities to get them to open up to him in ways that they normally wouldn't with him being an FBI agent. This book is the result of years and years worth of face to face conversations with some of the worst human beings to ever walk the planet. I don't know that anyone else could have written this book and managed to make it as believable as John Douglas.

If you are a fan of criminal psychology, read this book. Forget the who, what, and how. There's a bunch of "true crime" books out there that cover those issues. This book attempts to answer the "why". ( )

A must have for any thriller or mystery writer's shelf. ( )

The best dissection of motive of sexual predators and killers to date. Douglas is the foremost authority on murder/rape. ( )