"For more than ten years, a mysterious and violent predator committed fifty sexual assaults and ten sadistic murders. Then he disappeared. Three decades later, Michelle McNamara, a true crime journalist, pored over police reports, interviewed victims, and embedded herself in the online communities that were as obsessed with the case as she was. The masterpiece McNamara was writing at the time of her sudden death - offers an atmospheric snapshot of a moment in history and a chilling account of a criminal mastermind and the wreckage he left behind."