{"id":5971,"date":"2024-09-17T06:39:38","date_gmt":"2024-09-17T13:39:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=5971"},"modified":"2024-09-17T06:39:38","modified_gmt":"2024-09-17T13:39:38","slug":"michelle-chouinard-the-serial-killer-guide-to-san-francisco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/michelle-chouinard-the-serial-killer-guide-to-san-francisco\/","title":{"rendered":"Michelle Chouinard: The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I enjoy picking up a book where I don\u2019t know what to expect, and it\u2019s even better when the book I\u2019ve selected doesn\u2019t match my expectations — but in a good way. From the title, I supposed this book would be all shiny concept, heavy on clever plot, no emotional engagement, but probably funny.\u00a0 It does have a shiny concept, but the concept (as it should be), is just the kick off.\u00a0 Heroine Capri (like the car, the pants or the island) Sanzio, granddaughter of a serial killer, makes her living giving \u2013 you guessed it \u2013 serial killer tours of San Francisco.\u00a0 She\u2019s been quite successful, and the patrons only infrequently ask questions about her grandfather, who was known as \u201cOverkill Bill.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bill got his moniker because he used three methods to kill each of his victims (as Lenny on Law & Order<\/em> might put it, he used a belt and <\/em>suspenders).\u00a0 Her grandfather is long dead but when a copycat murder occurs, Capri latches on to it for several reasons.\u00a0 One, she thinks she might do a podcast about the new crime (along the way, hopefully exonerating her grandfather), and the reason she needs to do the podcast is that her ex mother in law has cut off grad school funding for her daughter. Then, the grandmother herself is killed in the exact same manner.\u00a0 Now the eyes of the police are on Capri and possibly her daughter, making her investigation even more important.<\/p>\n

The family pulls together in the wake of the grandmother\u2019s death.\u00a0 She was an unpleasant socialite who had been a difficult mother-in-law but Capri is still of the strong opinion that she didn\u2019t deserve to be murdered.\u00a0 The unexpected part of the novel comes in after the set up.\u00a0 Capri\u2019s family pulls together after it all goes down.\u00a0 We, as readers, get to know her daughter, her ex-husband, and her former father in law.<\/p>\n

Capri\u2019s doggedness also leads her to uncover many unpleasant realities about her ex mother in law\u2019s life, things that her family was completely unaware of. The tale of corruption and fraud she winkles out is really straight out of an old Rockford Files<\/em> episode. Meanwhile, the cops are on her ass and she\u2019s worried for her daughter.<\/p>\n

The tours she runs are sprinkled throughout the book, lending the story authentic atmosphere and a flavor of San Francisco – a city that\u2019s been home to killers, sure, but is also beautiful and historic.\u00a0 The little factoids about killers were often familiar to me (I did run a crime bookstore for decades) but they might be new to the reader.\u00a0 This wasn\u2019t really a light read but it was a fun one, with a tricky plot at the center. It was far from all high concept but instead returned to straight up mystery trope territory.\u00a0 I very much liked Capri and hope she makes another appearance. —\u00a0Robin Agnew<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I enjoy picking up a book where I don\u2019t know what to expect, and it\u2019s even better when the book I\u2019ve selected doesn\u2019t match my expectations — but in a good way. From the title, I supposed this book would be all shiny concept, heavy on clever plot, no emotional engagement, but probably funny.\u00a0 It … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1846,484,1844,100,1276,1845],"class_list":["post-5971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-family-dynamics","tag-humor","tag-michelle-chouinard","tag-minotaur-books","tag-robin-agnew","tag-the-serial-killer-guide-to-san-francisco"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5971"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5973,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5971\/revisions\/5973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}