The Killer of Little Shepherds: A True Crime Story and the Birth of Forensic Science

In this book, Starr expertly weaves the story of turn-of-the-century serial killer Joseph Vacher, with the early heroes of forensic science. The book is simply fascinating, both the tales of Vacher's crimes and the hunt for him, and the various people developing methods in forensics (like how to perform an autopsy, determine a person's height from a few bones, or finding out how long ago a person died). The book is well paced, and the performance of the narrator, Erik Davies, is wonderful.

I truly have nothing negative to say about it - it's great.

This is my pick for my audible book of the year. Mesmerizing. A perfect listen.

A riveting true crime story that vividly recounts the birth of modern forensics.

At the end of the nineteenth century, serial murderer Joseph Vacher, known and feared as “The Killer of Little Shepherds,” terrorized the French countryside. He eluded authorities for years—until he ran up against prosecutor Emile Fourquet and Dr. Alexandre Lacassagne, the era’s most renowned criminologist. The two men—intelligent and bold—typified the Belle Époque, a period of immense scientific achievement and fascination with science’s promise to reveal the secrets of the human condition.

With high drama and stunning detail, Douglas Starr revisits Vacher’s infamous crime wave, interweaving the story of how Lacassagne and his colleagues were developing forensic science as we know it. We see one of the earliest uses of criminal profiling, as Fourquet painstakingly collects eyewitness accounts and constructs a map of Vacher’s crimes. We follow the tense and exciting events leading to the murderer’s arrest. And we witness the twists and turns of the trial, celebrated in its day. In an attempt to disprove Vacher’s defense by reason of insanity, Fourquet recruits Lacassagne, who in the previous decades had revolutionized criminal science by refining the use of blood-spatter evidence, systematizing the autopsy, and doing groundbreaking research in psychology. Lacassagne’s efforts lead to a gripping courtroom denouement.

The Killer of Little Shepherds is an important contribution to the history of criminal justice, impressively researched and thrillingly told.

I think the book will be interesting - I'm looking forward to it. I would not under any circumstances get another book read by Erik Davies.

The reader (Erik Davies) reads... so... slowly... that... I... am... going... nuts. Plus, he has the truly snortworthy, eye-roll inducing habit of pronouncing "Paris" as "Pa-reeee" every time he says it, and he's reading this book in English. If you had a friend who went to Paris and insisted on referring to it as "Pa-reee" when telling you a story about her time there, what would you think of that? And if that was happening several times in every sentence? And if she was talking so slowly that you felt like making the "come on, come on" gesture at her? I mean, I've *lived* in Paris, been an actual ex-pat with a job and everything, and I do NOT call it "Pa-reee" when it comes up in conversation in English. Absolutely twee and pretentious. The level of tryhard on his french-fried pronunciation of any proper nouns reminds me of Garrison Keillor's hilarious maitre-d' at the Cafe Boeuf. Seriously awful and terribly jarring. Even French people pronounce "Paris" as "Pa-riss" when they are speaking English, just like I would call Chicago "Shee-CAH-go" if I said the name of the city while speaking French. Why switch in and out of essentially two languages the whole time, other than to be obnoxious and make yourself harder to understand? Ugh.

I hope to enjoy the book, but the performance was irredeemable.

You have to be very interested in the concepts of Forensic Science and want to understand where it comes from and the forerunners of this way of looking at criminals and their behavior. I am glad to know the names of the individuals who began this field and why.

Yes

Not quite so dry.

I would like to see one of the CSI shows mention it's beginnings which are set out in this story.

I liked the book, but I am very interested in the history of the forensic science utilized in criminology.

It was very hard to follow. The author jumps around so much it loses you.