Romantic Florence, a place nearly every visitor to Italy is passionate about. Yet a city blessed with such splendor and steeped in so much culture still has a dark side. "Even at the height of the Renaissance, beauty mingled with blood, civilization with savagery, in this city of paradox and contradiction."Beginning sometime in 1968 or 1974, depending upon which authority you listen to, a killer --- or killers --- brutally murdered young couples as they made love under the new moon on secluded lovers' lanes around Florence. The murders went on until 1985, gripping Florentines in an unaccustomed terror. The crimes were so horrific that the press dubbed him Il Mostro di Firenze, or The Monster of Florence.Hundreds of tips flooded the offices of investigators, keeping them very busy chasing down leads. Wives turned in husbands, shopkeepers pointed at rivals, cousins accused each other, and every new arrest gave residents hope. Dozens of suspects were paraded into the interrogation rooms with an impressive number of them tried and convicted, only to be released when the Monster killed again. Far from being discouraged, the police headed off in another direction, as sure of the accuracy of their newest theory as they had been of the previous one.Over a decade after the last victims were found slaughtered in the hills, American thriller novelist Douglas Preston moved his family to Florence with plans to write a great mystery there. By happenstance --- or maybe divine intervention --- Preston rented a house with a view of one of the scenes of the Monster's double homicides. For a mystery writer, the possibilities this discovery opened up proved simply irresistible, and Preston was soon embroiled in his own investigation of Il Mostro di Firenze.Italian journalist Mario Spezi had spent years following the cases and had written many articles about them. He hooked up with Preston and led him to the murder sites, opened up his own files to him, and introduced him to people with information. Spezi was elated at finding a new ear and eagerly embarked on a campaign to engender in Preston an enthusiasm equal to his own. It didn't take long for Preston to become irredeemably intoxicated with the story.What the pair found in their digging pushed them deeper and deeper into the city's most puzzling mystery. They were baffled at how the carabinieri and polizia had conducted the investigation. They were further baffled at how the prosecutor was lured into filing charges against several men despite good alibis. And then still further baffled at the rulings of the magistrates, which seemingly ignored inconvenient evidence.Finally, Spezi convinced Preston that he had figured out who Il Mostro was. All the evidence he had read and gathered pointed indisputably to one man. That individual was not one of the men who Italian law enforcement had in their sights, and Spezi's journalistic exposition on that point did not make the authorities happy. In fact, it made them unhappy to the point of arresting Spezi for several crimes, even hinting at his involvement in the actual murders. And then their attention turned to Preston. When authorities of a foreign government start to look too closely at your activities, it may be time to reconsider the path you've taken. Preston had to weigh his desire to follow the story with his desire to remain out of prison.THE MONSTER OF FLORENCE evokes a harsh contrast of gruesome crime scenes with the stunning background of Tuscany. It seems impossible that the bucolic hills could hold sinister secrets of such horrors. Preston and Spezi reveal the reality of living in Italy, with all of its quaint charm and its imperfect legal system. It's not all capos and Mafia that make the headlines there. It's at least one impotent psychopath with a sick desire to prove his power over other human beings. Not only will the Monster's bloody path horrify you, the treatment of these two authors will, too. --- Reviewed by Kate AyersWhen Douglas Preston moved his family to the outskirts of Florence in 2000, he thought he was just going to enjoy la dolce vita and write a mystery novel. What he found was both more interesting and scarier than any story he could have come up with on his own. As he was interviewing a journalist named Mario Spezi who was an expert on the Italian legal system, Spezi casually mentioned that just outside the villa Preston and his family had rented, was the site of one of the most gruesome murders in Florentine history. There, in 1983, the famed Monster of Florence had taken the lives of two of his victims.Slowly Preston found himself getting pulled into the mystery of the Monster of Florence, who had between the years of 1974 and 1985 killed at least 7 couples as they made love in various out-of-the-way places in the Tuscan hills. Various men had been tried and convicted of the crimes, but the cases did not offer compelling proof and Spezi believed that the killer or killers were still free. Preston joined Spezi in trying to find the real killer, but what neither of them could have known was that they themselves were going to be charged crimes in connection with the case. In Italy, important magistrates don't appreciate being shown up by the press and Preston and Spezi showed up the flaws in the Monster investigation. What starts out as a murder mystery soon turns to much much more -- a chilling indictment of the Italian legal system and the lack of freedom of the press in Italy.Preston and Spezi bring the people and places involved to life. The writing is crisp, the story well laid out and the implications of the abuse of government and suppression of a free press in a first world country shocking and important. So... Come for the monster, come for Florence, but stay for the journalists, who are much more interesting in the end.That this story is true makes it even more amazing..Reads like one of the Thomas Harris Hannibal Lector books with touches of the DaVinci Code and The Godfather thrown in for good measure. A great book---and it's true. Don't let the Italian names slow you down...just mumble through them and keep on trucking...Enjoy this book for what it is, a true story that reads like fiction...a book you won't be able to put down.And when you finish the book, you will rush to the internet to see what haps happened between the end of the book and now.It's that kind of book, that kind of story. This was a truly surprising experience. The story made for a quick read full of questions answered and unanswered. Many times, while reading, I shook my head in disbelief...this is so bizare at times that it sounds like it should be fictional. And the truly disturbing thing is that, if we are to believe everything we've read, all of this is real.It sounds like the Italian investigators have no real intention of ever solving these crimes. They're too worried about how they look in the public eye. Well, Preston and Spezi have sure made them look like fools to me. They just accused everyone they could think of. Maybe it would be fitting if they started pointing fingers at each other. Maybe the reason the crimes weren't solved in the 80's was because the Monster was an investigator. I'm being sarcastic of course, but in this case, who knows.I was disappointed that Preston and Spezi made contact with the most likely candidate to be the Monster and nothing came of it. He even taunted them...as if to say..."You know and I know...good luck proving this."I think it's safe to say that the Satanic cult nonsense is going to be the death of this case until someone who isn't wrapped up in themselves can step up in the investigation.However, in the words of Preston, "after all, this is Italy."I'm not normally a reader of non-fiction, but having heard a little about this story previously, I decided to give this book a try.I was totally fascinated with the story. Preston and Spezi have done a magnificent job in providing enough details of the murders without bogging it down with confusing forensic details and unnecessary speculation, although they do have their own theory as to who the killer is. Ultimately, this is not so much a story of the murders themselves, but of the botched investigation and the insanity surrounding those who were supposed to find the killer and bring justice to the victims, people who were more concerned with their own career status that they were willing to go to any lengths to manipulate the outcome to suit their own personal gain.For those like me who are not normally non-fiction readers, I recommend this book highly, especially for those who like crime/drama fiction.
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