Seventeen Blows

Praise for Mikita Brottman

“This riveting blow-by-blow account will keep you up all night!” —John Glatt, New York Times bestselling author on A Double Life

“In this riveting narrative from veteran author Mikita Brottman, she deftly unveils the illusion of normalcy to reveal a sordid realm of twisted desire and wicked intentions.” —Leslie Rule, author of A Tangled Web on A Double Life

“Brutal and breathtaking … Brottman lays out the facts with sensitivity and an unflinching mission to get to the heart of both victim and perpetrator. An absolute triumph.” —Emily Carpenter, author of Gothictown on A Double Life

“Brottman is one of today’s finest practitioners of nonfiction that explores the uncertain truths revealed when violence crashes into human life… . Offers a precise and rarely seen accounting of American hospitals for the criminally insane.” ―The New York Times Book Review on Couple Found Slain

“This is a learned, lucid, and finally heartbreaking account of urban obsession. It’s David Fincher’s film Zodiac crossed with Ms. Brottman’s wild take on the unknowability of life and the necessity of staying obsessed. Ms. Brottman is a groove―and so is her book.” ―James Ellroy on An Unexplained Death

“An excavation of the luridness and venality underneath a smiling, all-American façade.” —Kirkus Reviews on Guilty Creatures

“Brottman meticulously follows any and all threads she can … but Brottman’s book is, sneakily, more than just a true crime narrative.” —NPR on An Unexplained Death

“Engrossing… [written] with freshness and verve.” —Shelf Awareness on Guilty Creatures

“[A] compelling… deep dive into human nature.” —Booklist on Guilty Creatures

“So much more than another true crime story, Guilty Creatures is a psychological thriller as intricately organized as a Hitchcock movie. And, with its high literary values, it stands with classics of the genre like Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song and Capote’s In Cold Blood.” —Madison Smartt Bell, author of All Souls’ Rising

“This story has it all—adultery, obsession, murder, revenge, betrayal—but Brottman doesn’t settle for the superficial. Rather than a whodunit, Guilty Creatures is a compelling psychological double portrait of what happens when two people are forever bound by a life-altering secret.” —Becky Cooper, bestselling author of We Keep the Dead Close

“Guilty Creatures could have slinked out of fiction by Flannery O’Connor or Donna Tartt—not to mention James M. Cain—and they come alive in this richly atmospheric, deeply researched, and terrifying true crime book.” —Betsy Bonner, author of Round Lake and The Book of Atlantis Black

“Propulsive, harrowing, and ironic, Mikita Brottman’s impeccably researched story investigates how, under pressure, morals can twist to justify even the worst actions.” —Erika Krouse, author of Tell Me Everything: The Story of a Private Investigation on Guilty Creatures

“Brottman has established herself as a leading voice in modern true crime. She finds empathy in the criminal and shows compassion for those whom society wishes to simply forget. This is not just a well-written book, it’s an important book. A must read.” ―James Renner, author of True Crime Addict on Couple Found Slain

MIKITA BROTTMAN is a nonfiction author and psychoanalyst whose acclaimed books include A Double Life, Guilty Creatures, Couple Found Slain, and the Gold Dagger Award finalist, An Unexplained Death. A professor in the Department of Humanistic Studies at the Maryland Institute College of Art, she previously worked in forensic psychiatric facilities and the Maryland prison system. She lives in Baltimore.

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