A Viable Suspect

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A book review of A Viable Suspect: The Story of Multiple Murders and How a Police Force’s Reach Proved Too Short For Canada’s Most Notorious Cold Case by Barry Ruhl (SGT. [Ret.] Ontario Provincial Police)

A book review of A Viable Suspect: The Story of Multiple Murders and How a Police Force's Reach Proved Too Short For Canada's Most Notorious Cold Case by Barry Ruhl (SGT. [Ret.] Ontario Provincial Police)

Stars: ***

FriesenPress (2014)
Serial Killers
200 pages

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Summary: For more than 30 years, retired Ontario Provincial Police Sergeant Barry Ruhl has believed that a criminal with whom he had a violent encounter early in his career might be responsible for a string of unsolved murders of young women in Ontario, including the 1959 death of 12-year-old Lynne Harper. The only suspect ever investigated in that sensational case was 14-year-old Steven Truscott, who was convicted and sentenced to hang before being cleared almost 50 years later. But in the 1980s, Ruhl had approached his superiors with a theory about an alternative suspect in the Harper murder and other similar cases. A Viable Suspect tells the story of how Ruhl arrived at his conclusions, his frustrated attempts to prompt the OPP to thoroughly investigate Talbot and the tragic irony of how, just when it seemed police were finally taking Ruhl’s theory seriously, the suspect slipped out of reach, permanently….

A Viable Suspect

I picked this book up from a Little Free Library. I love those things. This book wasn’t as interesting as I thought it would be but I did want to finish it and enjoyed the crime talk so that’s why it’s a 3 star and not a 2.

It’s not a True Crime book like I thought it was because it’s not the full story of a crime from beginning to end. I’m having trouble explaining what the book is about so please refer to the summary for that.

The book was interesting because it felt like watching crime shows which I love to do. So crime lovers may still love this book. It was just not fulfilling because the criminal doesn’t get charged in the end. (this is not a spoiler, it says it in summary.)

I also enjoyed that it was Canadian. I always love reading about my home country.

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About Kathleen

I've been a nonfiction lover for as long as I can remember. I love children's nonfiction as well and love to share my knowledge and the books I gained them from, with the world. I wish more people would give nonfiction a chance.