Reviews with content warning for Murder - The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper

I had this on my TBR years ago and then dropped it because I didn't like the writing style. I remember there being a lot more conversations in the book (i.e. "so and so woke up and said x to her mother"), but that was not something in the book at all. Everything was either cited from primary sources (either specific to the women or general for the time), or was posed as a hypothetical ("she likely..." or "it's possible.."), so I have no idea what I was thinking?

Anyway, I'm glad I wound up trying this again because it was a great and informative read. I loved how Rubenhold told the women's stories, focusing on their lives rather than their deaths. It was a new angle for the Jack the Ripper story and it was well done. I'm really glad I didn't miss out on this one in the end!

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booksandlattesaddict's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

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beebeewin's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

As someone who had heard of Jack the Ripper all my life, it is a sad realization that until this book I hadn't thought about who his victims were. We embrace him as this thrilling mystery who deserves to be remembered, while the victims of his crimes are just demonstrations of his prowess. This book flipped that narrative on its head. With poetic writing and unflinching honesty, Rubehold gives voice to the five women and the society, with values that are eerily similar to modern society values, that put them in harms way. It was a society that failed to see them as anything but prostitutes deserving of their fate, something still echoed today. As said by Rubenhold, "By embracing him [Jack the Ripper], we embrace the set of values that surrounded him in 1888, which teaches women that they are of a lesser value and can expect to be dishonored and abused. We enforce the notion that 'bad women' deserve punishement and that 'prostitutes' are a subspecies of female." Allowing ourselves to paint over the fact that these women were complex mothers, friends, wives, lovers, and humans, gives Jack the Ripper the power once again over women who were already powerless. "Insisting Jack the Ripper killed prostitutes also makes the story of a vicious series of murders slightly more palatable." We get to ignore that these were human beings who were poor, disenfranchised, and misunderstood, to instead "gawp at and examine this miracle of malevolence... by figuratively stepping over the bodies of those he murdered, and in some case, stopping to kick them as we walked past." It was heartbreaking to here the story of Annie, Kate, Elizabeth, Mary Jane, and Polly and know that many women today like indigenous women, sex workers, trans women of color, are judged in the same fashion with violence against them being unnoticed or ignored. I will never see Jack the Ripper the same. I would say my biggest complaint was keeping all the names, dates, places, etc. straight. I almost wish there were more figures, timelines, or maps to help with context. I think for such a researched and thorough book it would have helped me absorb and understand more easily. That said I would definitely recommend this book to those true crime lovers, history buffs, and those looking for an informative yet tragic read. Your perspective will be forever changed.

Othe great quotes:

Shein anyone???- "Poor women's labor was cheap because poor women were considered expendable..."

One women, Elisabeth, was reported to police as a sex worker so she had to weekly strip and have her body searched for STIs along with other women, in public, and in the cold. "For a young women who had been raised in a religious community... the indignity of this experience would have been shocking. However, as Elisabeth was pregnant with a illegitimate child, is is likely that she, like so many women of her era, would have internalized the punishment as a justifiable one. Society and the church would have her believe she sinned against her parents, her community, herself, and God." Barf.

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