The Night of the Ripper
The author of Psycho takes on the famous unsolved slayings of Jack the Ripper!
Robert Bloch gave us fiction's most famous knife-wielding maniac in Psycho's Norman Bates, and in The Night of the Ripper (1984), this master of horror fiction offers his own unique take on history's most infamous unsolved murder case.
Whitechapel, 1888. A madman stalks the foggy streets, murdering prostitutes in acts of unimaginable horror and brutality. Two men - Frederick Abberline of the Metropolitan Police and Mark Robinson, a young American doctor - are determined to find the killer, but the list of suspects is a long one. With the help of a supporting cast of characters that includes Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, Arthur Conan Doyle, and the Elephant Man, the two sleuths must solve the puzzle before it's too late and the Ripper strikes again!
"Might be Bloch's best book yet . . . the sort of book that just grabs you and makes you read it." - Peter Straub
"May well nudge out Psycho as Bloch's most popular novel." - Washington Post
"A must for mystery and horror fans." - Fantasy Review
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Community Reviews
This definitely wasn't as dry as From Hell but, at the same time, I neither hated this novel nor loved it. I like the fact that Bloch is definitely old-school horror because it just has that feel, that style. I dig it. On the other hand, who he believes Jack the Ripper was? It just sort of left me feeling all waaa-waaa-waaaaaaaaaaaa.
The most disturbing thing about this read was that, at the beginning of each chapter, Bloch lists a date, a person/people, and a place before detailing what I'm going to assume is a real-life account of torture and horror. I never paid attention in any history classes so I'm just assuming this is factual information. Each little blurb at the start of each chapter just got progressively more and more horrifying.
And what did I walk away with? I still have no clue who Jack the Ripper actually was!
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