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New Harvest
February 2014
On Sale: February 18, 2014
Featuring: Veronica Gedeon
368 pages
ISBN: 0544114310
EAN: 9780544114319
Kindle: B00E3E4XMU
Hardcover / e-Book
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Historical | Mystery Historical
Beekman Place, once one of the most exclusive addresses in Manhattan, had a curious way of making it into the tabloids in the 1930s: βSKYSCRAPER SLAYER,β βBEAUTY SLAIN IN BATHTUBβ read the headlines. On Easter Sunday in 1937, the discovery of a grisly triple homicide at Beekman Place would rock the neighborhood yet againβand enthrall the nation. The young man who committed the murders would come to be known in the annals of American crime as the Mad Sculptor. Caught up in the Easter Sunday slayings was a bizarre and sensationalistic cast of characters, seemingly cooked up in a tabloid editorβs overheated imagination. The charismatic perpetrator, Robert Irwin, was a brilliant young sculptor who had studied with some of the masters of the era. But with his genius also came a deeply disturbed psyche; Irwin was obsessed with sexual self-mutilation and was frequently overcome by outbursts of violent rage. Irwinβs primary victim, Veronica Gedeon, was a figure from the world of pulp fantasyβa stunning photographerβs model whose scandalous seminude pinups would titillate the public for weeks after her death. Irwinβs defense attorney, Samuel Leibowitz, was a courtroom celebrity with an unmatched record of acquittals and clients ranging from Al Capone to the Scottsboro Boys. And Dr. Fredric Wertham, psychiatrist and forensic scientist, befriended Irwin years before the murders and had predicted them in a public lecture months before the crime. Based on extensive research and archival records, The Mad Sculptor recounts the chilling story of the Easter Sunday murdersβa case that sparked a nationwide manhunt and endures as one of the most engrossing American crime dramas of the twentieth century. Harold Schechterβs masterful prose evokes the faded glory of post-Depression New York and the singular madness of a brilliant mind turned against itself. It will keep you riveted until the very last page.
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