Phobias are intense fears that people often experience in regards to specific things or situations. A lot of the times, those fears are irrational. I personally have an intense, irrational fear and disgust in regards to whales. People who come into contact with some trigger are often sent into a state of panic. Manias are episodes of high excitement and energy that last for a prolonged period of time. I was less familiar with manias than phobias, so this book was a nice teaching tool for me in that respect. Both phobias and manias are common issues for a lot of people, and are treated frequently by mental health professionals.

I have read a couple of Kate Summerscale's books, and I have enjoyed and learned from every one of them. I was really looking forward to this one releasing. I typically enjoy books about different mental health issues, and, having had a few psychology classes before I switched majors, I read about several of the phobias mentioned. I liked that the overview of each one was brief, yet informative. I didn't want to waste a bunch of time on the ones that I was familiar with, but I did appreciate the refresher course. I very much enjoyed learning about the ones I had never heard of. I am pleased with this purchase. The cover art is also very nice. 

 Gary Heidnik was born in Eastlake, Ohio, in 1943. His parents divorced in 1946, and after spending some time with his mother, he was sent to live with his father and stepmother. He claimed that his father abused him, but his father denied doing any such thing. He was a good student, but was not well liked by his classmates. He was made fun of for having a weird shaped head and being weird in general, and he was pretty hateful when people tried to talk to him. He enrolled in a military school, but dropped out and enlisted into the Army. He did very well with his training, but was honorably discharged after a short time after being diagnosed with schizoid personality disorder. After that, he was in and out of psychiatric hospitals due to multiple suicide attempts and mental health crisis. Somehow, he wound up married to a woman from the Philippines that he met through a matchmaking service. (Which he should have never been selected for, because as much as I want to move myself out of the South in this circus of horrors for women's rights and lack of education, I would not want to marry someone like this to do so.) What is even worse, is this man procreated and had living children.

Heidnik began racking up a series of charges for his criminal record, beginning in 1976. Aggravated assault, deviant sexual practices, kidnapping, rape, etc. He began abducting women, keeping them in his basement, assaulting them and killing them. I will not go into a bunch of details here, because reading them and learning how truly disturbed this guy was was an essential part of the book. He did some really gruesome things to the women he abducted. Discovery of his crimes and how he was caught was worthy of being on World's Dumbest Criminals, if there ever was an example.

Some of the things in this book seemed very familiar to me, but I had never heard about this man. Turns out, he was one of the serial killers that they based the weirdo from Silence of the Lambs on. I have read a couple of books by this author, and I have no complaints over the writing style or the research put into the books. They are well written and informative. I think I have two more by this author I have left to read, and I am looking forward to those. If you are interested in this book, it is currently available on Audible Plus. This was a wild ride for waiting in the school pickup line this week. 

Skylar Neese was born in West Virginia in 1996 to David and Mary Neese. Skylar disappeared on the night of July 6, 2012. CCTV footage at her residence showed her exiting her bedroom window just after midnight and getting into a car with two girls. Police assumed that she had ran away, but her parents strongly disagreed. The two girls that she left with were reported to be her "best friends" and were interviewed by police, though they claimed they had dropped her back off after an hour. Lying hags. I won't spoil the book by going into anymore details than that about the case, except to say that Skylar's body was ultimately found on January 16, 2013...and it is FOUL that her parents had to go any length of time not knowing the truth about her.

One thing that enrages me about cases where someone is first declared missing is that police are SO QUICK to jump to "run away" instead of seeing the parade of red flags. Anytime you watch Unsolved Mysteries or Disappeared, that is THE FIRST thing they like to say. "Oh, they ran away. It isn't illegal to vanish and not tell anyone. They will turn up in a couple of days when they are ready." It's infuriating. What really happened to this girl is equally enraging. I cannot imagine doing to my friend what was done to this girl for the reasons that it was...or ever, really. People are just vile. They think they can do whatever for whatever reason and then get away with crimes and hatefulness like nothing ever happened. I had never heard of this case prior to reading this book, so I appreciated the level of detail the author went into about the case. I learned a great deal of information about the case, which is the point of reading true crime. This book is currently available on Audible Plus to listen to, and I think it was about 6 hours, maybe 7 hours.

 Otto Heinrich Frank was born in Frankfurt in 1889 to a liberal Jewish family. He had the opportunity to study economics, and then traveled to the United States to spend time with friends while working at Macys. He returned to Germany before the onset of World War I, ultimately serving in the Imperial German Army. In fact, he was present at the infamous Battle of the Somme. After the war, he began his career at a bank. He married Edith in 1925. Their daughter, Margot, was born the following year, in 1926. Anne, their second daughter, was born in 1929. (Unfortunately, Edith died in Auschwitz from starvation/disease. Margot and Anne were removed to Bergen-Belsen, where they died from typhus.)

I had no idea that Otto Frank remarried after the death of his family. His second wife was a Holocaust survivor as well, and her daughter is a well known speaker about this topic, Eva Schloss. Of course, The Diary of Anne Frank was required reading in high school for me and helped to foster my interest and eventual degree path in World War II history. Otto Frank also kept his own diary, and this book is filled with personal reflections from that, which I very much enjoyed. This author did a tremendous about of research on this topic, and it really gave you a sense of the man behind Anne Frank and her diary. He had a very interesting life up to the point of the Holocaust, which I think has been overlooked and diminished in the wake of Anne's diary and the Holocaust itself. The Holocaust stripped away identities of millions of people, and this is just another point proven in that regard. I learned a great deal from this book, and I am glad that I ran across it. I would suggest reading this as a companion to the Anne Frank book if you want a more detailed family history for her. 

 Jenelle Potter was by all accounts an adult woman that suffered from some learning disabilities and who had been bullied because of that, as well as for having a childlike speaking voice and overprotective parents. She spent a lot of time on the internet, which, as we all know, can have some extremely rude people floating around. Jenelle was introduced to Billy Payne, who in turn introduced her to his cousin, Jaime, and they began dating. Jaime snuck her a cell phone that her parents did not know about and they spent a lot of time texting. (Yes, she was a grown adult. Yes, she still lived at home.) Once Billy Payne began dating, and having a child with someone else, Jenelle claimed that she was a victim of cyber bullying and basically blamed that on Billy and his girlfriend. Jenelle began crying about that to her parents, and a "former classmate and CIA agent" of hers began emailing her Mom talking about how horrible Billy and his girlfriend were......from the same IP address as Jenelle's computer. Imagine that. Unfortunately, Billy Payne and Billie-Jean Hayworth were murdered, with Mr. and Mrs. Potter, Jamie, and Jenelle being implicated.

This book was available on Audible Plus, and I added it to my library because I like true crime, and also because this happened fairly near to where I live. Mountain City, Tennessee, where these murders took place, is just under four hours from my little slice of the state. I had to look this place up, because I had never heard of it, but nevertheless. This case was absolutely bizarre, but tracks for the kind of nonsense that goes on here. It's a shame that Billy and Billie-Jean's son will never know his parents because of someone like Jenelle and those associated with her. The outcome of the case and the sentences handed out seemed a bit weird to me, and I think I would have gone a different way with some of that. Unfortunately, in a recent article about this case, there are appeals and Mrs. Potter's conviction was overturned in favor of a new trial. I would absolutely suggest checking for new developments after finishing this book, and making that a habit for all true crime books you read. As far as this book goes, it was written by the prosecution, so the facts of the case were presented properly and it was informative and decently written. 

 Michelle Goots Michael, most commonly known as Shelly, was a straight A Student, high school and college cheerleader, and pediatric nurse. She began working at a hospital, where she was very flirty and bubbly, much to the annoyance of some of her coworkers. She wound up catching the eye of her future husband, James "Jimmy" Michael. The problem was...both were married to other people. The two married after leaving their respective spouses. In 2005, Shelly was called at work and told her house was on fire. When she arrived home, she began acting in a way that emergency personnel deemed suspicious. As it turns out, they were right to be suspicious of Shelly, though I won't go into anymore details and spoil the book for those who have not read it.

This case was covered on 48 Hours, Snapped, and several true crime podcasts. John Glatt is an investigative journalist, and this really serves him well in his true crime books. He presents a vast wealth of information in a way that is easy to follow and understand, which is great because I am nosey and like to know all the details about everything. I really appreciate the writing style of this author and the time he puts into the details. Even though there is a lot of information, you do not get overwhelmed or buried in it. The more I read about this woman and her statements she made to police and others...wow. She was something else. If you are a true crime reader, and you have not read this book or any by this author, you should do yourself a favor and pick up a couple. 

 In this book, the author gives sufficiently interesting and informative portraits of serval well known names from the "Wild West" days, and also includes some lesser known individuals. Some of the more well known names are the Earp brothers, Butch Cassidy, Frank and Jessie James, and Billy the Kid. Some of the lesser known individuals were probably well known in the geographic area the book focuses on, but probably not well known throughout the broader West. In several instances in this book, the author says that the individual being covered was "one of the most dangerous" gunslingers in the West, however, they didn't really seem to warrant such a connotation. It was a bit weird.

I disliked the fact that the book is meant to be about the American West, which covered a vast amount of area during this time, yet the book focuses on El Paso. It should have been titled differently if that was going to be the case. As it turns out, the author is from El Paso, which explains the interest, but the book could have been better served if the horizons were broadened. I think that I would rate this as a history book for those interested in a light reading history moment...the characters in the book were real, historical figures. The events were historical events. The biographies are brief, and would also be great for those who just want an introduction into this particular topic. I'm giving this two stars, because I did enjoy the short biographies of each of these guys, but I was a little put off by the things mentioned above in combination with my slight lack of interest in the overall topic. 

 In the Post World War II era, the United Nations were interested in coming up with a Universal Declaration of Human Rights to ensure that people all over the world were treated with basic dignity and rights to live and thrive. This was an effort to prevent more atrocities like the Holocaust from being committed. Eleanor Roosevelt was an intelligent, outspoken lady, who had an extreme interest in this endeavor. She used all her diplomatic skills to get everyone in agreement on this and get something signed. It was a very good read, and I learned a lot. 

 I had never heard of this particular religious group until I got this book. I learned a fair amount about it, and supplemented that with some Google searches about Herbert Armstrong and the Worldwide Church of God. Reading this book, and others like it, really puts into perspective the impact of religious instruction in children. I cannot imagine the confusion that a small child would have with the kind of doctrine that was taught and all the questions one would have. This was an interesting first hand experience. I really enjoyed this book. 

 This book gave a pretty good glimpse into what life on the frontier was like. It was not one of my favorite books of the year, but I was determined to learn more about United States History, and this was a good one for that. He was well researched and the material was presented in a manner that was engaging. It was a decent read.