Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.63 AVERAGE
3.63 AVERAGE
dark
informative
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Incest, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual violence, Torture, Murder
Really gives a great insight truly into the controlling minds of killers. I was quite intrigued by this as well as Jason's bravery! I just like others are curious to know what makes these people tick, how can they live with themselves or even believe that what they did wasn't wrong or that they deserved it. He has great insight into how negative you can make yourself instantly putting yourself in that environment - I worked in prisons for a bit myself and don't think I could have done what Jason did. Very interesting read!
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
On one of my true crime Facebook groups, this was recommended by another member due to a question was asked about the possibly of writing to criminals in jail. Yes, there are websites that make this possible.
If this prospect has ever grabbed your interest... you will NEVER want to after reading Moss’ experiences.
This book is not for the faint hearted.
I had to keep pinching myself as I would keep forgetting that this a true crime memoir! Some of this book is truely unbelievable.
If you are Squeamish.. back away. SERIOUSLY!
This was a great read, just a shame that the world lost the author 7 years later.
RIP Jason Moss.
If this prospect has ever grabbed your interest... you will NEVER want to after reading Moss’ experiences.
This book is not for the faint hearted.
I had to keep pinching myself as I would keep forgetting that this a true crime memoir! Some of this book is truely unbelievable.
If you are Squeamish.. back away. SERIOUSLY!
This was a great read, just a shame that the world lost the author 7 years later.
RIP Jason Moss.
All my reviews can be found at: http://jessicasreadingroom.com
~~~~
When you decide to begin a ‘hobby’ there are not many people who would do what Jason Moss did: write to prison inmates. And not just prison inmates, but infamous serial killers! Even more shocking is that Jason did this at 18 years old and his parents knew about it.
The Last Victim is Moss’ first-hand account of his writing to infamous killers and ‘getting in their head’ by posing as what would be their ‘ideal’ victim. Moss writes it as if he is talking to you. The Last Victim was released while I was in college and I read it twice. I was a psychology major and took as many criminal justice type classes as I could. I was going through my reading only true crime books phase, so this book was perfect for me at that time of my life. Also, Moss was just a few years older than me!
Now, Kim and I both chose to listen to the audible version she bought and bring you a double review. I did not have much memory of this memoir as it has been at least 15 years since I read it. The Last Victim is candid, shocking, and extremely disturbing. I don’t know if there is a difference between reading the book and having it narrated to you, but I found myself turning the volume down as I was driving when the book got to the graphic contents. I guess I did not want people to possibly hear what I was listening to! I don’t know what Gacy sounded like, but the narrator’s portrayal of him is just frightening!
Moss writes not just one, but multiple killers in the same time frame. He wrote John Wayne Gacy, Charles Manson, Richard Ramirez, and Jeffrey Dahmer among others. Moss shares his letters with candor and this book is not for the faint hearted. Gacy was extremely and heavily sexually graphic in his letters. Gacy’s writings are really things you do not want to know. Moss’ communications with Dahmer were short lived as he was murdered in prison. Dahmer was also sexually graphic in his writings. Moss was upset at Dahmer’s death as he felt he did not get to cover more with Dahmer.
It’s hard to comprehend someone writing to these killers, especially someone at Moss’ young age AND his parents also knowing! Granted, Moss kept the extent of the communication between him and the killers a secret. Even harder to believe is that Moss used his younger brother in his communications with Gacy. Writing these killers is disturbing enough, but Moss even talked on the phone and visited Gacy several times shortly before his execution. Moss naively thought he could ‘handle Gacy’ due to Gacy’s age and physicality, forgetting the fact that he killed more than 30 boys that were Moss’ age. The fact the people actually write these killers and look up to them is incomprehensible.
This experience obviously affected Moss as I saw an interview with him saying that if he could go back in time then he would not have written the first letter. Also, Moss also committed suicide on 6/6/06 and there is much speculation about the date of his suicide. The research he did to communicate with Ramirez must have stayed with him, as Ramirez was a Satanist.
This is a dark and disturbing true life account that has a sad ending. Even the title has a double meaning as Moss truly was Gacy’s last victim. This memoir will not be for everyone and I urge very high reader discretion before picking up The Last Victim.
Despite the content, The Last Victim is recommended.
~~~~
When you decide to begin a ‘hobby’ there are not many people who would do what Jason Moss did: write to prison inmates. And not just prison inmates, but infamous serial killers! Even more shocking is that Jason did this at 18 years old and his parents knew about it.
The Last Victim is Moss’ first-hand account of his writing to infamous killers and ‘getting in their head’ by posing as what would be their ‘ideal’ victim. Moss writes it as if he is talking to you. The Last Victim was released while I was in college and I read it twice. I was a psychology major and took as many criminal justice type classes as I could. I was going through my reading only true crime books phase, so this book was perfect for me at that time of my life. Also, Moss was just a few years older than me!
Now, Kim and I both chose to listen to the audible version she bought and bring you a double review. I did not have much memory of this memoir as it has been at least 15 years since I read it. The Last Victim is candid, shocking, and extremely disturbing. I don’t know if there is a difference between reading the book and having it narrated to you, but I found myself turning the volume down as I was driving when the book got to the graphic contents. I guess I did not want people to possibly hear what I was listening to! I don’t know what Gacy sounded like, but the narrator’s portrayal of him is just frightening!
Moss writes not just one, but multiple killers in the same time frame. He wrote John Wayne Gacy, Charles Manson, Richard Ramirez, and Jeffrey Dahmer among others. Moss shares his letters with candor and this book is not for the faint hearted. Gacy was extremely and heavily sexually graphic in his letters. Gacy’s writings are really things you do not want to know. Moss’ communications with Dahmer were short lived as he was murdered in prison. Dahmer was also sexually graphic in his writings. Moss was upset at Dahmer’s death as he felt he did not get to cover more with Dahmer.
It’s hard to comprehend someone writing to these killers, especially someone at Moss’ young age AND his parents also knowing! Granted, Moss kept the extent of the communication between him and the killers a secret. Even harder to believe is that Moss used his younger brother in his communications with Gacy. Writing these killers is disturbing enough, but Moss even talked on the phone and visited Gacy several times shortly before his execution. Moss naively thought he could ‘handle Gacy’ due to Gacy’s age and physicality, forgetting the fact that he killed more than 30 boys that were Moss’ age. The fact the people actually write these killers and look up to them is incomprehensible.
This experience obviously affected Moss as I saw an interview with him saying that if he could go back in time then he would not have written the first letter. Also, Moss also committed suicide on 6/6/06 and there is much speculation about the date of his suicide. The research he did to communicate with Ramirez must have stayed with him, as Ramirez was a Satanist.
This is a dark and disturbing true life account that has a sad ending. Even the title has a double meaning as Moss truly was Gacy’s last victim. This memoir will not be for everyone and I urge very high reader discretion before picking up The Last Victim.
Despite the content, The Last Victim is recommended.
This book was pretty good -- very violent, sexual and disturbing -- but good. Though I can't say that toying with the minds of various serial killers for the sake of a self-created school project was a smart idea, I can't deny that it wasn't fascinating. It's pretty clear to see that as the author pretends to be various versions of himself, changed to fit the victimology of the killers, it's clear that he's chipping away at authentic aspects of himself, which definitely beings in some questions of authenticity as a reader. You definitely get an inside glimpse into the mind of some of the most famous killers, especially Joh Wayne Gacy, which was interesting. I would recommend this for any true crime fan to check out from a library. Not really worth buying for keeps or reading a second time.
This book is haunting. What Jason Moss does is incredible, and incredibly terrifying. He literally becomes pen pals with serial killers, and even gets himself shut alone in a room with one of the worst. He really was the last victim of one of the scariest men in history. If you are a true crime junkie or just fascinated by the abnormal psyche of a serial killer, then this book is for you. I have read a lot of crime fiction, true crime, and profiling books, and this was one of the most interesting takes on the whole subject that I have come across. Kudos to Jason for his bravery (or insanity).
TRIGGER WARNING (sexual assault, violence, gore, domestic violence)
I will never recommend this book to anyone. That’s enough of a review.
I will never recommend this book to anyone. That’s enough of a review.
This was one of the weirder true crime books I've read. Jason Moss wrote to various serial killers and posed as their ideal victim, in an attempt to get them to establish a rapport. It often worked, with the greatest success and the bulk of the book's focus being on John Wayne Gacy. This includes excerpts from their letters which were profoundly disturbing.
The book is short--and would be fewer pages if it was in a normal sized font, but it's one of those where you can tell right off the font sized was increased to make the book appear a bit longer. There are various things like that which have been done to pad the length. The most egregious of which is Moss's rants about his personal life, conflict with his mother, and school. He sounds like a whiny teen boy because the book took place while he was a whiny teen boy. But man does it get annoying. I'd recommend skipping the first 10 chapters because they don't even get into Gacy or other killers, it's just him talking about himself.
This book was interesting and if it had been written better I'd have given it 4 stars. But the bad writing and whiny tone really bring down the quality. The disturbing letter snippets also make the book hard to digest, but that's just part of reading true crime.
The book is short--and would be fewer pages if it was in a normal sized font, but it's one of those where you can tell right off the font sized was increased to make the book appear a bit longer. There are various things like that which have been done to pad the length. The most egregious of which is Moss's rants about his personal life, conflict with his mother, and school. He sounds like a whiny teen boy because the book took place while he was a whiny teen boy. But man does it get annoying. I'd recommend skipping the first 10 chapters because they don't even get into Gacy or other killers, it's just him talking about himself.
This book was interesting and if it had been written better I'd have given it 4 stars. But the bad writing and whiny tone really bring down the quality. The disturbing letter snippets also make the book hard to digest, but that's just part of reading true crime.
"Like most of us, Jason has a dark side, a part of himself that is both repulsed by and drawn to violence and murder (Pg. 274, Jeffry Kottler, Ph.D.)." I think this sentence perfectly sums up why most of us read true crime. Jason's book is an interesting and unique book for those of us who like to delve into these cases.
Jason Moss decided to correspond with serial killers partly as a college assignment and partly for his own experiment. The killer he ended up corresponding with the most was John Wayne Gacy. It was interesting to me how Jason molded himself into different types of people in his letters depending on which killer he was writing to. He gained inside information that others weren't able to find out about how Gacy actually acted with his victims. The experiment really took a toll on his psyche and had some effects that stayed with him long after it was done.
Unfortunately, Jason committed suicide in 2006 and it is not known whether it was partly due to the things he did and experienced in order to conduct this experience and write the book.
Jason Moss decided to correspond with serial killers partly as a college assignment and partly for his own experiment. The killer he ended up corresponding with the most was John Wayne Gacy. It was interesting to me how Jason molded himself into different types of people in his letters depending on which killer he was writing to. He gained inside information that others weren't able to find out about how Gacy actually acted with his victims. The experiment really took a toll on his psyche and had some effects that stayed with him long after it was done.
Unfortunately, Jason committed suicide in 2006 and it is not known whether it was partly due to the things he did and experienced in order to conduct this experience and write the book.