What do You think about Anyone You Want Me To Be: A True Story Of Sex And Death On The Internet (2004)?
This is true story about John Robinson, the internets first serial murderer in the late 90'0s A Olathe Kansas father is in prison fro homicide and some disappreances. He pursued chat rooms and enticed women with false offers persuading them to move to his hometown. Then the women moved and disappeared. This is a new age of social media where it is easy to become a victim of cybercrime. This author warns us to be careful about the dangers of cyberspace because you do not who you are dealing with. This book is a compelling example of how the net can be used by the most dangerous people in our society. He warns us not to make ourselves vulnerable in cyberspace. A very good book, I never knew about crime on the internet before.
—Roxanne
This is a fast paced true Crime novel about the murderer John Robinson, who started off his criminal career with fraud and embezzling money. Later as the Internet became more popular he would surf the net looking for his victims. Finding women who he could lure into his sadistic life. This book has some really graphic parts and also deals with the world of S&M, getting into detail about his relationships with some of the girls and how he made them sign slave contracts. Once again it is amazing to see what someone can accomplish and get away with for so many years just by being a smooth talker and knowing how to read other people. Compiling more and more information on them through casual conversations and then using that knowledge against them. Quite sick. Makes you really think about how much information you give out over the internet, do you really know who you have been talking too??? This book also contains 8 pages of photos of John Robinson and some of his victims.
—Slayermel
I've read several books by John Douglas, the man who started the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit, and so while browsing the true crime section in Borders (my guilty pleasure), I was thrilled to see another one. Douglas typically writes with co-author Mark Olshaker, and his take (while admittedly, one point of view) on high-profile crimes and the role of behavior in understanding them is often fascinating and entertaining. This book, while based on a very interesting case, was markedly less well-written than the others I have read (e.g., Mindhunter, Obsession). It is apparent from this work that Douglas very much needs a co-author that is a very good writer, and the one he worked with on this book (Stephen Singular) is shockingly bad. The writing is so bad that it really distracts from the story itself, which is never a good thing.I'm really hoping that Douglas brought Olshaker on board for the BTK book he recently put out, because I'd like to read it but I don't know if I can take another Singular tome.In sum, definitely the weakest of Douglas' books because of the mediocre quality of writing.
—Katie Fowler
