Bitter Harvest

So it's weird. I have owned this book for a while, but never got around to reading it. I think it's because I watched this on a couple of television shows (Forensic Files and Murderous Affairs). So to read Ann Rule's insight into a couple that ended up in a toxic marriage that resulted in a fire that killed two of their children will have you reading each page while holding your breath.

The incident takes place in 1995, but we go back to see the beginning of the married couple (Doctor Debora Green and her husband Doctor Michael Farrrar). Initially attracted to his skinner and more lively wife (the number of times it's said that Debora is not attractive anymore due to her weight gain, haircut, and clothes is unreal) when he first meets show more her, Michael realizes pretty quickly he made a bad decision. I don't even know what to say about this, because I know a lot of friends who have married in haste and repented in leisure. In Michael's case he realized it was a mistake on their wedding night. I also get from the story that includes quotes from Debora (Rule did visit with her) I don't think she ever really liked him too. Instead, I think they both stayed with each other due to expectations foisted on them by what society expects of a man/woman.

I didn't like Debora, but I also didn't like Michael Farrar. I felt for their three kids (Tim, Kelly, and Lissa) and just felt as if the two adults in this situation were acting like children. You are also going to get to read about Farrar having an affair. I like that Rule doesn't pull any punches with her depictions of everyone in this one. I don't think she cared for Farrar that much either. Even so, I did have sympathy for the man when you realize what he and his family (his kids) have been put through. One wonders if there could have been anything he could have done if more people had been willing to call out something that they saw was wrong (a mother who was being emotionally manipulative of her kids and an actual danger to her husband).

We also get an insight into a woman that Farrar has an affair with (I had some thoughts about her) as well as the law enforcement and prosecution that is involved with this.

I really enjoyed the writing in this one. Probably because Rule managed to keep the story moving along without any huge digressions into other things. I think her having just one story to tell and not an anthology helped things along the way.

The setting is primarily focused in Kansas and you do get a great sense of the area/neighborhood and how tight knit the community was before and after the events in this book.

Even when you think you are at an end, Rule comes back and shows you what Debora's side of the story is/was and you just end up shaking your head all over again. show less

Rule is well-known for her true crime writing and justifiably so. Ever since Truman Capote popularized the form in In Cold Blood, true crime has become a popular genre.

This harrowing book tells the story of Dr. Debora Green, a very bright Kansas physician whose life unraveled into a nightmare of murder and virtual insanity. After her trial for the murder of two of her children and the attempted murder of her husband, Michael Farrar, psychiatrists attempted to answer why something like this could have happened. Their diagnosis was that Dr. Green had a limited ego, was a very immature person with the emotional responses of a small child. Ostensibly, she was able to function quite well, until her marriage and the pressures of raising a show more family began to stress her life. She had an IQ of 165 and had zipped through medical school, married a brilliant cardiologist, and borne three children. The family lived in a large house in the Kansas City suburbs.

By the end of the story Debora had become a violent and irrational monster who had driven away her husband, as she descended into a maelstrom of alcohol, drugs and invective. In hindsight, a house fire that destroyed an earlier home was probably her doing. The final straw was apparently her husband's affair with Celeste Walker, a nurse whose physician husband had committed suicide. The family had returned from a long-awaited vacation to South America, when Mike became deathly ill. He could keep no food down and suffered constant diarrhea. His condition puzzled the clinicians because the symptoms did not seem to match anything in their knowledge base. The only thing they could think of was that perhaps Mike had picked up some kind of virulent bug while traveling, but none of the others who had been on the trip had suffered anything beyond the normal traveler's stomach problems that quickly disappeared.

Bouts of his illness always seemed to come after he had been released from the hospital and had eaten food served by his wife. After what seemed - to me - an interminable period he began to suspect that perhaps Debora might be trying to poison him. One afternoon when she was out, he searched her purse and discovered several packages of Castor beans. Warnings on the package labels revealed that these beans contain a very toxic poison called Ricin. Normally, the beans could be swallowed whole without much difficulty because they had such a hard shell, and the beans would pass through the system without causing any ill effects, but if crushed, they could be terribly destructive. Mike also realized his wife had just finished an Agatha Christie novel in which the murder is committed using Ricin.

Several months later, a fire, clearly arson, broke out in their house. Mike had moved out in preparation for a divorce. Two of the children died, trapped in their bedrooms by a fire, fed with accelerants, that blocked access to the hall and the stairs. The responding police and firemen were immediately struck by the mother's bizarre behavior, talking of her children in the past tense, even before anyone knew whether they had been killed or not. Eventually, she confessed to all charges and escaped the death penalty with a guilty plea.

A truly tragic story spellbindingly told by Rule, a master of the genre. show less

the "queen" of true crime. This story is about Dr. Debora Green and the poisoning of her husband and death of 2/3 of her children. As usual, Rule does a great job of setting up the story with lots of background as well as courtroom drama. The only thing I think she skimped on were the psychiatric details. What the accused a sociopath, insane, psychopath, etc? Perhaps those are details that could not be divulged. However, it was an open courtroom so I'm not sure if these lacking details were public evidence or not. 508 pages (16 hours 31 mins). I listened to this on audio and the narrator was great.

While a little longer than necessary in some sections, this is a very well written account of true crime. I was very wrapped up in the story and continued to wonder about how and why Debra Green got into the position she was in. A must read if you love true crime and/or are from the area.

This one works as How To Put Together Your Whodunnit. The way each new piece of information clicks into place is masterful storytelling.

I picked it based on the narrator alone but after listening for a bit, I think perhaps this is an earlier work and her voice isn't "aged" as well as it was in a recent book I listened to (The Good House).

"A Woman's Fury, a Mother's Sacrifice" from the title sounds like my interest but I think instead of a strong woman the story might be more about an asshole woman.

The fact that it's abridged didn't help either boost my interest either.

I vaguely remember reading about the trial of Deborah Green in the Kansas City Star a number of years ago so I was fascinated when I discovered this book. Dr. Deborah Jones Green was in a second marriage to Dr. Mike Farrar with three children. Their marriage was unhappy but to the outside world everything seemed fine until Dr. Farrar went on a trip to Peru with some students and parents of their children's private school. Here he fell in love with a very attractive woman who was also in an unhappy marriage.

Dr. Green was exceptionally intelligent; however, she had many difficulties getting along with people and had changed medical specialties a number of times. In her youth she was attractive and vivacious; now she had gained weight and show more let her appearance go. She was an at home mom with three children: Tim, the oldest who was especially angry with the father; Lessa, who was also an angry child; and Kelly, apparently the happiest. After Dr. Farrar asked for a divorce, Dr. Green's actions became violent and all of a sudden Dr. Farrar was suffering from some kind of unspecified disease which caused him great pain and weight loss. Dr. Farrar moved out of the mansion in Prairie Village and into an apartment.

In October, 1995, the mansion caught on fire and Tim and Kelly were killed in the fire; Lissa managed to escape. Dr. Green's initial interviews with the police and fire personnel was extremely strange never even asking about her children. Soon charges are filed against her for murder. During this time, Dr. Farrar has figured out that he has been gradually poisoned by the use of an extreme poison found in castor beans. Charges of attempted murder were added.

The book goes into great detail regarding the lives of Dr. Green, Dr. Farrar, the children and Dr. Farrar's lover, Celeste Walker, whose husband committed suicide. Intriguing story of someone with so much intellect, yet without any kind of sensitivity to others. One psychiatrist claimed she had the emotional level of a toddler. Today she is still held in the Kansas Correctional facility in Topeka after she did plea guilty to all charges thus avoiding the death penalty. show less