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A review by rbruehlman
Mindhunter: Inside the Fbi's Elite Serial Crime Unit by John E. Douglas, Mark Olshaker
2.0
Urgh, hard pass on this book for me.
Mindhunter was made into a hit Netflix TV series (which I have not seen), so the book will surely be good, right? Ehhhhh. I think the entire reason Netflix made it--and why it was popular--is because people are fascinated by the topic of true crime, not that Mindhunter itself is good.
Firstly, I really dislike the author. The first hundred pages of this book are inexplicably dedicated to Douglas's personal life. This was unexpected, but probably would have been okay / interesting if Douglas was able to tell a concise, tight and compelling story about how he got interested in FBI profiling and psychology, etc. He eventually does talk about that, but he takes sooooo long to get there. Most of those hundred pages is filled with boring, irrelevant details such as his time playing football in high school and how he met his wife. He's a clunky writer, producing easy-to-read, but bland, "I did this, then I did that" prose (is prose even the right word here?). So all of it is just ... boring to read, in every respect. Douglas pretty clearly thinks highly of himself, with crass offending-people-is-funny humor. I imagine Douglas as one of those stereotypical muscled dumb jocks you see depicted in Hollywood high school scenes--little substance and huge ego. Not a jerk, and I think he's well-intentioned. but I just got the sense he isn't the sharpest tool in the shed and is very, very happy with himself, with a levity and self-assuredness that grated.
Ironically, I found myself wondering a lot more about the psychology of police and FBI members than I did serial killers. I have nothing against the police--some are good, some are bad--but I think people join law enforcement for all sorts of reasons. Some want to better their community and give back; some love the power and control; others love the "bad guy / good guy" chase and are driven by the adrenaline rush and the camaraderie of working on a team in a high-stakes environment. I think Douglas is the third sort of guy. He frequently referred to "getting the bad guys" in a way that just felt ... like it was oversimplifying the actual gravity of his work. Was Douglas actually there because he wanted to help victims and restore justice, or did he just like the high-adrenaline rush and the identity of chasing "the bad guys" with his fellow "good guys"? I felt like it was the latter. Criminal investigations aren't a game of cops and robbers, but the way Douglas talks about it, you would think it was.
Finally, after about a hundred pages, Douglas's torturously boring biographical section ended, and we got into the real meat--criminal profiling. This was better, but I still didn't have a great time reading.
I've had a lifelong fascination with the developmental underpinnings of psychopathy, so I'm no stranger to reading about serial killers. At one point I could impassionately read about brutal crimes. I clearly no longer can; reading this book bothered me. The lurid detailing of crime after crime after crime in this book almost felt salacious. Yeah, talking about the crime is inevitable for discussing criminal profiling, but I didn't need that many cases in that much gory detail. It was so many to the point of where I felt like the focus of the book was just recounting serial killers' crimes, not an actual thoughtful analysis of profiling.
I think that was part of the problem, in fact. I don't feel like I learned about how profiling actually works. Douglas would throw out these wildly specific profiles that were, evidently, very accurate, but while some of the conclusions made sense, others felt like lucky leaps of logic that I would not have come up with in a million years and didn't really understand where he got them from, either. I'd have appreciated a more systemic breakdown of the different "profile clusters", and then more thoughtful analysis on why each trait factored into the profile, and then tied it back to a case study or two. Instead, it was the reverse--a lurid description of the crime, a profile presented without much explanation, and onto the next murder.
A book that talked about how criminal profiling works would probably also have addressed the cases of where criminal profiling falls apart, or leads a case astray. It's not a perfect science, after all. But all we got were Douglas's resounding successes... probably in keeping with his well-intentioned but self-aggrandizing personality.
I think true crime fascinates lots of people, and if you want all the ugly details of awful serial killer crimes, this is the book for you. If you want a thoughtful, analytical exploration into the criminal psyche, however, this is not it.
Mindhunter was made into a hit Netflix TV series (which I have not seen), so the book will surely be good, right? Ehhhhh. I think the entire reason Netflix made it--and why it was popular--is because people are fascinated by the topic of true crime, not that Mindhunter itself is good.
Firstly, I really dislike the author. The first hundred pages of this book are inexplicably dedicated to Douglas's personal life. This was unexpected, but probably would have been okay / interesting if Douglas was able to tell a concise, tight and compelling story about how he got interested in FBI profiling and psychology, etc. He eventually does talk about that, but he takes sooooo long to get there. Most of those hundred pages is filled with boring, irrelevant details such as his time playing football in high school and how he met his wife. He's a clunky writer, producing easy-to-read, but bland, "I did this, then I did that" prose (is prose even the right word here?). So all of it is just ... boring to read, in every respect. Douglas pretty clearly thinks highly of himself, with crass offending-people-is-funny humor. I imagine Douglas as one of those stereotypical muscled dumb jocks you see depicted in Hollywood high school scenes--little substance and huge ego. Not a jerk, and I think he's well-intentioned. but I just got the sense he isn't the sharpest tool in the shed and is very, very happy with himself, with a levity and self-assuredness that grated.
Ironically, I found myself wondering a lot more about the psychology of police and FBI members than I did serial killers. I have nothing against the police--some are good, some are bad--but I think people join law enforcement for all sorts of reasons. Some want to better their community and give back; some love the power and control; others love the "bad guy / good guy" chase and are driven by the adrenaline rush and the camaraderie of working on a team in a high-stakes environment. I think Douglas is the third sort of guy. He frequently referred to "getting the bad guys" in a way that just felt ... like it was oversimplifying the actual gravity of his work. Was Douglas actually there because he wanted to help victims and restore justice, or did he just like the high-adrenaline rush and the identity of chasing "the bad guys" with his fellow "good guys"? I felt like it was the latter. Criminal investigations aren't a game of cops and robbers, but the way Douglas talks about it, you would think it was.
Finally, after about a hundred pages, Douglas's torturously boring biographical section ended, and we got into the real meat--criminal profiling. This was better, but I still didn't have a great time reading.
I've had a lifelong fascination with the developmental underpinnings of psychopathy, so I'm no stranger to reading about serial killers. At one point I could impassionately read about brutal crimes. I clearly no longer can; reading this book bothered me. The lurid detailing of crime after crime after crime in this book almost felt salacious. Yeah, talking about the crime is inevitable for discussing criminal profiling, but I didn't need that many cases in that much gory detail. It was so many to the point of where I felt like the focus of the book was just recounting serial killers' crimes, not an actual thoughtful analysis of profiling.
I think that was part of the problem, in fact. I don't feel like I learned about how profiling actually works. Douglas would throw out these wildly specific profiles that were, evidently, very accurate, but while some of the conclusions made sense, others felt like lucky leaps of logic that I would not have come up with in a million years and didn't really understand where he got them from, either. I'd have appreciated a more systemic breakdown of the different "profile clusters", and then more thoughtful analysis on why each trait factored into the profile, and then tied it back to a case study or two. Instead, it was the reverse--a lurid description of the crime, a profile presented without much explanation, and onto the next murder.
A book that talked about how criminal profiling works would probably also have addressed the cases of where criminal profiling falls apart, or leads a case astray. It's not a perfect science, after all. But all we got were Douglas's resounding successes... probably in keeping with his well-intentioned but self-aggrandizing personality.
I think true crime fascinates lots of people, and if you want all the ugly details of awful serial killer crimes, this is the book for you. If you want a thoughtful, analytical exploration into the criminal psyche, however, this is not it.