History Of A Drowning Boy

Dennis Nilsen was one of Britain's most notorious serial killers, jailed for life in 1983 after the murders of 12 men and the attempted murders of many more.Seven years after his conviction, Nilsen began to write his autobiography, and over a period of 18 years he typed 6,000 pages of introspection, reflection, comment and explanation.History of a Drowning Boy - taken exclusively from these astonishing writings - uncovers, for the first time, the motives behind the murders, and delivers a clear understanding of how such horrific events could have happened, tracing the origins back to early childhood.In another first, it provides an insight into his 35 years inside the maximum-security prison system, including his everyday life on the wings; his interactions with the authorities and other notorious prisoners; and his artistic endeavours of music, writing and drama. It also reveals the truth behind many of the myths surrounding Dennis Nilsen, as reported in the media.Nilsen was determined to have his memoir published but to his frustration, the Home Office blocked publication during his lifetime. He died in 2018 entrusting the manuscript to his closest friend and it is now being published with the latter's permission.Any autobiography presents the writer's story from just one perspective: his own, and as such this record should be treated with some caution. An excellent foreword by criminologist Dr Mark Pettigrew offers some context to Nilsen's words, and this important work provides an extraordinary journey through the life of a remarkable and inadequate man.Extract from the Foreword by Dr Mark Pettigrew, criminologistIn the UK, there are thought to be at least two serial killers active at any one time; in the USA the figure is estimated to be as high as fifty. Although a relatively rare phenomenon, there is a great deal of public interest in the life and crimes of serial killers. Yet, despite the inordinate amount of interest, the serial killer remains one of the least understood types of criminal - even in the academic world the simple definition of a serial killer has still not been settled.In a saturated market of true crime novels, there are very few that include the voice of the actual killer. As such, amongst a literary sea of accounts devoted to the serial killer and his crimes, this book stands out as unique. Of course any subjective retelling by the killer must be approached with caution; the prevalence of personality disorders, psychopathy, paranoid schizophrenia and other psychiatric and mental disorders, can distort the personal account just as an attempt at self-aggrandising can misrepresent the true narrative of the crimes. Yet, the simple facts of a case can be gleamed from police records, trial testimony and crime scene evidence, whereas personal introspection offers much more of an insight into the motivation of the killer.As the reader will learn from these memoirs, a confluence of factors met to form Dennis Nilsen. In all the academic and clinical research on the topic, there is no definitive answer as to why or how a person becomes a serial killer. Realistically, we can only identify risk factors. What this book offers, though, is an insight into how those killings are comprehended and understood by the killer in retrospect. In my own conversations with Dennis Nilsen, over several years, he did not try to excuse what he did, nor trivialise the devastating effect his actions had upon the families and loved ones of his victims. Instead, he sought to understand his actions in light of his particular circumstances. I cannot honestly say that he ever found a definitive answer as to why he became one of Britain's most infamous serial killers, but if the answer is ever to be found, it will be found within these pages.

________________________________________ AN UNSPEAKABLE CRIME When he was arrested in July 1991, Jeffrey Dahmer had a severed head in the refrigerator, two more in the freezer, two skulls and a skeleton in a filing cabinet. A DEPRIVED ACT But if anything could be more disturbing than the brute horror of this scene, it was the evidence that Dahmer had been using these human remains not only for sexual gratification, but as part of a dark ritual of his own devising -- to furnish a shrine to himself. A KILLER, BEYOND OUR UNDERSTANDING ________________________________________ The Shrine of Jeffrey Dahmer offers a chilling insight into the mind of a serial killer and reveals the horrors within. Perfect for fans of Making a Murderer, Mindhunter and The Ted Bundy Tapes, this is a gripping and gruesome read that delves into the mind of a murder and what possesses someone to kill. __________ By the author of Killing for Company, which was adapted into the hit ITV true crime drama DES, starring David Tennant. __________ PRAISE FOR THE SHRINE OF JEFFREY DAHMER: 'Irresistible. . . . It's subject is terrible and repellent. But the study itself is enlightening' Independent 'Unputdownable' Patricia Highsmith 'The persuasive account of a young man spiraling into unspeakable insanity . . . fascinating' Daily Telegraph

Josh Henneha has always been a traveler, drowning in dreams, burning with desires. As a young boy growing up within the Muskogee Creek Nation in rural Oklahoma, Josh experiences a yearning for something he cannot tame. Quiet and skinny and shy, he feels out of place, at once inflamed and ashamed by his attraction to other boys. Driven by a need to understand himself and his history, Josh struggles to reconcile the conflicting voices he hearsÑfrom the messages of sin and scorn of the non-Indian Christian churches his parents attend in order to assimilate, to the powerful stories of his older Creek relatives, which have been the center of his upbringing, memory, and ongoing experience. In his fevered and passionate dreams, Josh catches a glimpse of something that makes the Muskogee Creek world come alive. Lifted by his great-aunt LucilleÕs tales of her own wild girlhood, Josh learns to fly back through time, to relive his peopleÕs history, and uncover a hidden legacy of triumphs and betrayals, ceremonies and secrets he can forge into a new sense of himself. When as a man, Josh rediscovers the boyhood friend who first stirred his desires, he realizes a transcendent love that helps take him even deeper into the Creek world he has explored all along in his imagination. Interweaving past and present, history and story, explicit realism and dreamlike visions, Craig WomackÕs Drowning in Fire explores a young manÕs journey to understand his cultural and sexual identity within a framework drawn from the community of his origins. A groundbreaking and provocative coming-of-age story, Drowning in Fire is a vividly realized novel by an impressive literary talent.

An intimate and poignant memoir about the family of Alan Kurdi—the young Syrian boy who became the global emblem for the desperate plight of millions of Syrian refugees—and of the many extraordinary journeys the Kurdis have taken, spanning countries and continents. Alan Kurdi’s body washed up on the shore of the Mediterranean Sea on September 2, 2015, and overnight, the political became personal, as the world awoke to the reality of the Syrian refugee crisis. Tima Kurdi first saw the shocking photo of her nephew in her home in Vancouver, Canada. But Tima did not need a photo to understand the truth—she and her family had already been living it. In The Boy on the Beach, Tima recounts her idyllic childhood in Syria, where she grew up with her brother Abdullah and other siblings in a tight‑knit family. A strong‑willed, independent woman, Tima studied to be a hairdresser and had dreams of seeing the world. At twenty‑two, she emigrated to Canada, but much of her family remained in Damascus. Life as a single mother and immigrant in a new country wasn’t always easy, and Tima recounts with heart‑wrenching honesty the anguish of being torn between a new home and the world she’d left behind. As Tima struggled to adapt to life in a new land, war overtook her homeland. Caught in the crosshairs of civil war, her family risked everything and fled their homes. Tima worked tirelessly to help them find safety, but their journey was far from easy. Although thwarted by politics, hounded by violence, and separated by vast distances, the Kurdis encountered setbacks at every turn, they never gave up hope. And when tragedy struck, Tima suddenly found herself thrust onto the world stage as an advocate for refugees everywhere, a role for which she had never prepared but that allowed her to give voice to those who didn’t have an opportunity to speak for themselves. From the jasmine‑scented neighbourhoods of Damascus before the war to the streets of Aleppo during it, to the refugee camps of Europe and the leafy suburbs of Vancouver, The Boy on the Beach is one family’s story of love, loss, and the persistent search for safe harbour in a devastating time of war.

‘He'd just learnt to walk,’ she said. ‘He was sitting playing on his blanket, then all of a sudden he was gone.’ A 16-month-old boy is found drowned in a pond right by his home. Chief Inspector Sejer is called to the scene as there is something troubling about the mother’s story. As even her own family turns against her, Sejer is determined to get to the truth.

Cameron Barnett's debut poetry collection, selected by Ada Limón as winner of the 2017 Rising Writer Contest

The definitive story of the Dennis Nilsen case featured in BBC's The Nilsen Tapes, and the book behind ITV's Des, starring David Tennant ***WINNER OF THE GOLD DAGGER AWARD FOR CRIME NON-FICTION and THE NUMBER ONE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER*** __________________ Dennis Nilsen, who died in May 2018, admitted to killing at least 15 people before his arrest in 1983. This ground-breaking criminal study of his killings was written with Nilsen's full cooperation, resulting in a fascinating - and horrifying - portrait of the man who worshipped death. In February 1983, residents of Muswell Hill had been plagued by blocked drains. When a plumber was called to investigate, he discovered a large blockage of biological material. To his horror, it appeared to be formed of human flesh and bones. The next day, local resident Dennis Nilsen was arrested. 'Are we talking about one body or two?' a detective asked. Nilsen replied 'Fifteen or sixteen, since 1978. I'll tell you everything.' Within days he had confessed to fifteen gruesome murders over a period of four years. His victims, mostly young gay men at a time when society cared little for them, had been overlooked. Killing for Company is a unique study of a murderer's mind, essential reading for true crime aficionados. __________________ 'You really have to read this extraordinary book to get a full flavour of the weirdness of Nilsen and his crimes' SUNDAY TIMES 'A seminal look into the criminal mind' DAILY MAIL 'Brian Masters has given us a full, well-ordered, dispassionate account of Nilsen's life and crimes' THE TIMES 'Without any doubt one of the most remarkable, complete and most humanely informative accounts of a murderer's mind ever achieved... the book is far superior to any previous English book of its kind and deserves to serve as a model for all future attempts in this genre' NEW SOCIETY 'The book is a perceptive and at times coldly brutal assessment of Nilsen's psychology' MIRROR 'A comprehensive and compelling account' FINANCIAL TIMES 'Brian Masters can rest assured that the job he undertook with such obvious doubts was one worth doing' SPECTATOR 'Probably the best thing of its kind since In Cold Blood . . . a classic study in criminal mentality' YORKSHIRE POST 'Killing For Company must stand as one of the most remarkable and accurate accounts ever written of the singular relationship between a mass murderer and a society . . . a bloody masterpiece.' BERYL BAINBRIDGE 'A truly awesome tale, brilliantly told' LITERARY REVIEW 'A meticulous study of the dark intricacies of the human mind' THE BOOKBAG 'Masters has written an extraordinary book, and his achievement has been the ability to recount horrific details without descending to the lurid sensationalism of the instant books and Fleet Street reports' POLICE 'A compelling and remarkable book ... through Masters' fine writing the reader suspends his nausea for the crimes, and concentrates with Nilsen on his motives and himself' THE LISTENER

Dennis Nilsen was one of Britain's most notorious serial killers, jailed for life in 1983 after the murders of 12 men and the attempted murders of many more.Seven years after his conviction, Nilsen began to write his autobiography, and over a period of 18 years he typed 6,000 pages of introspection, reflection, comment and explanation.History of a Drowning Boy - taken exclusively from these astonishing writings - uncovers, for the first time, the motives behind the murders, and delivers a clear understanding of how such horrific events could have happened, tracing the origins back to early childhood.In another first, it provides an insight into his 35 years inside the maximum-security prison system, including his everyday life on the wings; his interactions with the authorities and other notorious prisoners; and his artistic endeavours of music, writing and drama. It also reveals the truth behind many of the myths surrounding Dennis Nilsen, as reported in the media.Nilsen was determined to have his memoir published but to his frustration, the Home Office blocked publication during his lifetime. He died in 2018 entrusting the manuscript to his closest friend and it is now being published with the latter's permission.Any autobiography presents the writer's story from just one perspective: his own, and as such this record should be treated with some caution. An excellent foreword by criminologist Dr Mark Pettigrew offers some context to Nilsen's words, and this important work provides an extraordinary journey through the life of a remarkable and inadequate man.