The Mad Sculptor: The Maniac, the Model, and the Murder that Shook the Nation
Written by Harold Schechter
Narrated by Peter Berkrot
4/5
()
About this audiobook
2015 Edgar Award Nominee
Beekman Place, once one of the most exclusive addresses in Manhattan, had a curious way of making it into the tabloids in the 1930s: SKYSCRAPER SLAYER, BEAUTY SLAIN IN BATHTUB read the headlines. On Easter Sunday in 1937, the discovery of a grisly triple homicide at Beekman Place would rock the neighborhood yet again—and enthrall the nation. The young man who committed these murders would come to be known in the annals of American crime as the Mad Sculptor.
Caught up in the Easter Sunday slayings was a bizarre and sensationalistic cast of characters, seemingly cooked up in a tabloid editor's overheated imagination. The charismatic perpetrator, Robert Irwin, was a brilliant young sculptor who had studied with some of the masters of the era. But with his genius also came a deeply disturbed psyche; Irwin was obsessed with sexual self-mutilation and was frequently overcome by outbursts of violent rage.
Irwin's primary victim, Veronica Gedeon, was a figure from the world of pulp fantasy—a stunning photographer's model whose scandalous seminude pinups would titillate the public for weeks after her death. Irwin's defense attorney, Samuel Leibowitz, was a courtroom celebrity with an unmatched record of acquittals and clients ranging from Al Capone to the Scottsboro Boys. And Dr. Fredric Wertham, psychiatrist and forensic scientist, befriended Irwin years before the murders and had predicted them in a public lecture months before the crime.
Based on extensive research and archival records, The Mad Sculptor recounts the chilling story of the Easter Sunday murders—a case that sparked a nationwide manhunt and endures as one of the most engrossing American crime dramas of the twentieth century. Harold Schechter's masterly prose evokes the faded glory of post-Depression New York and the singular madness of a brilliant mind turned against itself. It will keep you riveted until the very end.
Harold Schechter
Harold Schechter is a professor of American literature and culture. Renowned for his true-crime writing, he is the author of the nonfiction books Fatal, Fiend, Bestial, Deviant, Deranged, Depraved, and The Serial Killer Files. He lives in New York State. For more information, visit www.haroldschechter.com.
More audiobooks from Harold Schechter
Maniac: The Bath School Disaster and the Birth of the Modern Mass Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hell's Princess: The Mystery of Belle Gunness, Butcher of Men Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Butcher's Work: True Crime Tales of American Murder and Madness Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ripped from the Headlines!: The Shocking True Stories Behind the Movies’ Most Memorable Crimes Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Serial Killer Files: The Who, What, Where, How, and Why of the World's Most Terrifying Murderers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Man-Eater: The Life and Legend of an American Cannibal Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Psycho USA: Famous American Killers You Never Heard Of Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fiend: The Shocking True Story Of America's Youngest Serial Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Devil's Gentleman: Privilege, Poison, and the Trial That Ushered in the Twentieth Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Whole Death Catalog: A Lively Guide to the Bitter End Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related to The Mad Sculptor
Related audiobooks
Tremors in the Blood: Murder, Obsession, and the Birth of the Lie Detector Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Jack the Ripper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Black Dahlia, Red Rose: The Crime, Corruption, and Cover-Up of America's Greatest Unsolved Murder Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Boston Strangler Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Devil's Gentleman: Privilege, Poison, and the Trial That Ushered in the Twentieth Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Psycho USA: Famous American Killers You Never Heard Of Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fiend: The Shocking True Story Of America's Youngest Serial Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Wicked Boy: The Mystery of a Victorian Child Murderer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Axeman of New Orleans: The True Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Girls of Murder City: Fame, Lust, and the Beautiful Killers Who Inspired Chicago Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Whole Death Catalog: A Lively Guide to the Bitter End Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Invention of Murder: How the Victorians Revelled in Death and Detection and Created Modern Crime Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Man-Eater: The Life and Legend of an American Cannibal Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5H.H. Holmes: The True History of the White City Devil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Monster City: Murder, Music, and Mayhem in Nashville’s Dark Age Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Inside Broadmoor: Up Close and Personal with Britain's Most Dangerous Criminals Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Wilderness of Ruin: A Tale of Madness, Fire, and the Hunt for America's Youngest Serial Killer Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Killer Genius: The Bizarre Case of the Homicidal Scholar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hastened To the Grave: The Gypsy Murder Investigation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Crime of the Century: Richard Speck and the Murders That Shocked a Nation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yorkshire Ripper: The Secret Murders: The True Story of Serial Killer Peter Sutcliffe's Reign of Terror Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5American Murder Houses: A Coast-to-Coast Tour of the Most Notorious Houses of Homicide Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Female Serial Killers: How and Why Women Become Monsters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Alice & Gerald: A Homicidal Love Story Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5America's Femme Fatale: The Story of Serial Killer Belle Gunness Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Murder For You
If You Tell: A True Story of Murder, Family Secrets, and the Unbreakable Bond of Sisterhood Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Our Little Secret: The True Story of a Teenage Killer and the Silence of a Small New England Town Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mindhunter: Inside the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Daughter's Deadly Deception: The Jennifer Pan Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ghosts That Haunt Me Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Invention of Murder: How the Victorians Revelled in Death and Detection and Created Modern Crime Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Unspeakable Acts: True Tales of Crime, Murder, Deceit, and Obsession Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5While Idaho Slept: The Hunt for Answers in the Murders of Four College Students Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In the Name of the Children: An FBI Agent's Relentless Pursuit of the Nation's Worst Predators Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Conviction: The Untold Story of Putting Jodi Arias Behind Bars Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Blood on Their Hands: Murder, Corruption, and the Fall of the Murdaugh Dynasty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stranger Beside Me Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Obsession: The FBI's Legendary Profiler Probes the Psyches of Killers, Rapists, and Stalkers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Trigger: Narratives of the American Shooter Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Evidence of Love: A True Story of Passion and Death in the Suburbs Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The I-5 Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Killing in Amish Country: Sex, Betrayal, and a Cold-blooded Murder Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Road to Jonestown: Jim Jones and Peoples Temple Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Murderer Next Door: Why the Mind Is Designed to Kill Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Deliberate Cruelty: Truman Capote, the Millionaire's Wife, and the Murder of the Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Angel Makers: Arsenic, a Midwife, and Modern History’s Most Astonishing Murder Ring Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Little Shoes: The Sensational Depression-Era Murders That Became My Family's Secret Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Written in Bone: Hidden Stories in What We Leave Behind Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5After Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Death's Acre: Inside the Legendary Forensics Lab--The Body Farm--Where the Dead Do Tell Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for The Mad Sculptor
14 ratings0 reviews