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Slenderman: Online Obsession, Mental Illness, and the Violent Crime of Two Midwestern Girls Kindle Edition
The first full account of the Slenderman stabbing, a true crime narrative of mental illness, the American judicial system, the trials of adolescence, and the power of the internet
On May 31, 2014, in the Milwaukee suburb of Waukesha, Wisconsin, two twelve-year-old girls attempted to stab their classmate to death. Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier’s violence was extreme, but what seemed even more frightening was that they committed their crime under the influence of a figure born by the internet: the so-called “Slenderman.” Yet the even more urgent aspect of the story, that the children involved suffered from undiagnosed mental illnesses, often went overlooked in coverage of the case.
Slenderman: Online Obsession, Mental Illness, and the Violent Crime of Two Midwestern Girls tells that full story for the first time in deeply researched detail, using court transcripts, police reports, individual reporting, and exclusive interviews. Morgan and Anissa were bound together by their shared love of geeky television shows and animals, and their discovery of the user-uploaded scary stories on the Creepypasta website could have been nothing more than a brief phase. But Morgan was suffering from early-onset childhood schizophrenia. She believed that she had seen Slenderman long before discovering him online, and the only way to stop him from killing her family was to bring him a sacrifice: Morgan’s best friend Payton “Bella” Leutner, whom Morgan and Anissa planned to stab to death on the night of Morgan’s twelfth birthday party. Bella survived the attack, but was deeply traumatized, while Morgan and Anissa were immediately sent to jail, and the severity of their crime meant that they would be prosecuted as adults. There, as Morgan continued to suffer from worsening mental illness after being denied antipsychotics, her life became more and more surreal.
Slenderman is both a page-turning true crime story and a search for justice.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherGrove Press
- Publication dateAugust 16, 2022
- File size4.3 MB
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From the Publisher
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Editorial Reviews
Review
Praise for Slenderman:
Named a Best Nonfiction Crime Book of 2022 by CrimeReads
Named a Most Anticipated Book by the Rumpus
“Hale spent seven years poring over thousands of pages of court documents, police reports and other public records . . . The lesson of Slenderman is not about tracking your kids’ internet usage, evolving friendships, or enthusiasms and aversions. It’s that serious mental illness can manifest in people who seem far too young to have such adult problems.”—Lisa Levy, New York Times Book Review
“Hale’s compassionate look at the case is a compelling yet harrowing read that reveals how a seemingly innocent childhood friendship could lead to such a devastating outcome.”—Mae Anderson, AP News
“With clear-eyed prose and deep legal research . . . Slenderman is a skilled and detailed retelling of a story that still mystifies many years later . . . Hale’s intervention into this recent saga of American moral panic is a fulsome, if sobering, story of misdirected pre-teen social angst and cyberspace obsession. Slenderman may have been debunked in the popular imagination but he lives on as an enduring metaphor for the shadowy corners of the internet and the corrupting danger that our online existences can have to our offline realities.”—Nathan Smith, New York Observer
“A gripping read about a true crime that could have been averted.”—People, “Best New Books”
“A balanced, well-researched, and thoughtful account of an extremely sensational case and its even more sensational aftermath . . . A must-read for anyone interested in this case.”—Jesyka Traynor, True Crime Index
“Searing . . . As the first researcher into the case to draw extensively from transcripts of vital records, Hale has produced what stands as the most accurate account to date of this horrifying episode. This is a must for true crime fans.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“The Slenderman case can seem impenetrably bizarre, but Hale nimbly documents the numerous contributing factors to the online legends, the crime and its judicial outcome . . . Moreover, Hale is originally from Wisconsin, providing her well-developed true-crime narrative with an insider's take on social and cultural norms that fostered the communication breakdown among authority figures who might have tuned into the suspicious circumstances before a crime could be committed . . . [Hale’s] steady narrative vision brings clarity to a thoroughly upsetting situation.”—Shelf Awareness
“Kathleen Hale’s Hazlitt piece on the Slenderman story still stands out from the general sensationalist coverage of the case for its level of empathy for all involved. When two middle schoolers stabbed another middle schooler in the woods in 2012, they claimed to do it on behalf of a mysterious figure known as Slenderman. Hysterical parenting sites spread a moral panic about CreepyPasta, the website where stories of Slenderman originated and then became memes. However, undiagnosed schizophrenia, midwestern stoicism, and intense friendship dynamics are much more to blame for the attack, as Kathleen Hale illustrates here.”—CrimeReads
“Hale breathlessly recounts this unspeakable tragedy but holds her focus on the courtroom and society’s failures in treating the mentally ill. Her message is resonant: We must do better for those in need . . . Beyond the horrific incident at its center, the book expands into a searing criticism of how society treats (and mistreats) the mentally ill. A relevant true-crime cautionary tale as well as an urgent plea for mental health awareness.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Inside this intimate, plain-spoken masterpiece lies a haunted secret garden of feverish childhood fears and fantasies. It’s a shadow world for which nothing can prepare you, and one which I doubt you’ll ever be able to shake.”—Walter Kirn, author of Blood Will Out: The True Story of a Murder, a Mystery, and a Masquerade
“A riveting and beautifully written exploration of a tragedy, powered by rigorous reporting and equally rigorous sense of empathy. The Slenderman story that briefly obsessed the tabloids turns out to be about so much more in Hale’s capable hands: Midwestern girlhood, early onset schizophrenia, the failures of our criminal justice system, and the uneasy power of childhood friendships.”—Rachel Monroe, author of Savage Appetites
“Kathleen Hale’s Slenderman is a haunting, powerful, accomplished, and necessary book that is impossible to put down.”—Sonia Faleiro, author of The Good Girls
“Slenderman is a fluent and stylish account of a childhood folie à deux and its tragic aftermath. Through careful first-hand research and personal interviews, Kathleen Hale exposes the destructive force behind this case—not the fictional supernatural Slenderman, but the monstrous failure of the judicial system when it comes to forensic mental health. Slenderman is a work of wise sympathy.”—Mikita Brottman, author of Couple Found Slain
“Slenderman is a tour-de-force, a riveting and shocking read. On one level, it provides a remarkable reconstruction of a chilling crime, the stabbing of a twelve-year-old by two of her friends—a murderous assault that she somehow survived. And simultaneously, it is a frightful tale of how the state of Wisconsin dealt with the deeply disturbed young girls who committed the crime. The product of immense amounts of painstaking research, Slenderman is a gripping and utterly compelling account of two overlapping nightmares. You won’t soon forget this book.”—Andrew Scull, author of Desperate Remedies: Psychiatry’s Turbulent Quest to Cure Mental Illness
About the Author
Kathleen Hale a crime writer based in Los Angeles. Her reporting has been featured in Vanity Fair, among other outlets. Slenderman is her first true crime book.
Product details
- ASIN : B09MXBCG6R
- Publisher : Grove Press (August 16, 2022)
- Publication date : August 16, 2022
- Language : English
- File size : 4.3 MB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Not Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Print length : 350 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #344,094 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #41 in Social Aspects of the Internet
- #171 in Violence in Society (Kindle Store)
- #256 in Sociological Study of Medicine
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
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Kathleen Hale is an true crime author, TV writer, and journalist. She has published two young adult murder mysteries (NO ONE ELSE CAN HAVE YOU; NOTHING BAD IS GOING TO HAPPEN), one essay collection (CRAZY STALKER), and the award-winning, Edgar-nominated non-fiction book, SLENDERMAN. Her controversial novel NO ONE ELSE CAN HAVE YOU was recently banned in Florida for its “sexual content.”
Customer reviews
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Learn more how customers reviews work on AmazonCustomers say
Customers find the book insightful and informative about a fascinating topic. They find the author empathetic and compassionate towards the people involved. The writing quality is described as clear, elegant, and easy to read. Readers describe the story as riveting and gripping.
AI-generated from the text of customer reviews
Customers find the book insightful and informative about a fascinating topic. They describe it as well-researched, compelling, and impactful. The author does a phenomenal job of presenting multiple perspectives of these chilling events.
"...It shines a light on mental health and the justice system's ignorance of those struggles. It's a complicated tale with no neat bow tied at the end...." Read more
"This book is very well written and extremely interesting. After watching several shows about this case, I thought I knew everything about it...." Read more
"...A true story that kept me rapt and thinking about it even when I wasn't reading...." Read more
"I just finished Slenderman and loved it. It is well written and researched - it outlines the facts/story clearly and in a way that paints an..." Read more
Customers find the book empathetic and informative. They appreciate the author's compassion for the bad guy and Morgan and Anissa. The book provides an insightful analysis of a tragic event and humanizes mental illness.
"...It recounts the events of the crime and the circumstances surrounding it with real insight and understanding of the societal factors at play...." Read more
"Hale provides an engrossing, thorough analysis of a tragedy that we all thought we understood but really didn’t before this book." Read more
"...well researched by Kathleen Hale, she seemed to be very empathic towards Morgan and Anissa in how impressionable they were...." Read more
"...Easy to read, very empathetic to the people involved, incredibly informative; the author takes time to explain things that might not have been clear..." Read more
Customers appreciate the writing quality of the book. They find it well-written, easy to read, and informative. The author takes time to explain things clearly, with masterfully inserted quotes. Overall, readers describe the book as an excellent account of the lead-up to the crime and its fallout.
"...Nonetheless the story is written with such clarity and ease that you can't help turning the page" Read more
"This book is very well written and extremely interesting. After watching several shows about this case, I thought I knew everything about it...." Read more
"...Terrific is how well it was written, more like a novel, chronologically laid out and quotes masterfully inserted...." Read more
"...It is well written and researched - it outlines the facts/story clearly and in a way that paints an overarching POV on how mental illness and the..." Read more
Customers find the book engaging. They describe it as a gripping page-turner.
"...crime was very interesting, and the study of schizophrenia, riveting...." Read more
"Engrossing, thorough analysis..." Read more
"A gripping page turner..." Read more
"Absolutely riveting!!..." Read more
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on September 4, 2022This book takes you through a misunderstood crime that was much more complicated than the media portrayed it. It recounts the events of the crime and the circumstances surrounding it with real insight and understanding of the societal factors at play. It shines a light on mental health and the justice system's ignorance of those struggles. It's a complicated tale with no neat bow tied at the end. It's a set of difficult circumstances for everyone involved where you feel for all the victims. Nonetheless the story is written with such clarity and ease that you can't help turning the page
- Reviewed in the United States on September 29, 2023This book is very well written and extremely interesting. After watching several shows about this case, I thought I knew everything about it. However this book showed me the other side - the side we didn't hear about before. It helped me see that it wasn't just black and white. There's a whole lotta gray in it.
For the life of me tho, I cannot understand how the Geysers couldn't see something was very wrong with their daughter especially with her father having untreated mental health issues. I truly believe a lot of this lies at their feet. No parent is perfect but I think most parents would have done something for their daughter long before it reached the point it did.
It's just so sad for everyone involved. You have to wonder if it could have been prevented
- Reviewed in the United States on December 18, 2022Terrible is the illness, the crime & the way the courts treated the young victims. Terrific is how well it was written, more like a novel, chronologically laid out and quotes masterfully inserted. A true story that kept me rapt and thinking about it even when I wasn't reading. There was one thing I found rather comical, though: Wisconsin weather isn't as terrible as the writer makes it out to be. I live a few hours north of Waukesha, where the story takes place, and that distance makes for what we northers quip to be balmy. But that was a miniscule part of the book that I felt had nothing to do with the unraveling of this well-written true story.
- Reviewed in the United States on January 10, 2024I’ve just started this book and am already frustrated by careless editing. It’s never a given that a reader will acquaint herself/himself easily with all the book’s characters. This writer confuses the reader by introducing in the first chapter two new names. Period. The names seem to be new names for characters who have already entered into the narrative under different names. No explanation.
I will struggle on a bit longer despite a certain hostility toward the author.
- Reviewed in the United States on September 8, 2022When the news broke about this story I was stunned. I live in Milwaukee so this hit close to home. It was so weird at the start and then got weirder. The victim is lucky to be alive and I am thankful for the bicyclist who was in the right place at the right time to summon help quickly.
Some reviewers have criticized the book as being too Morgan-centered, but there is a reason (I'm guessing): the victim doesn't need to have her life publicized more than it has been. If she wants to tell her side, that is up to her. If she wants to get on with her life and put this behind, I support that. Morgan's life is better documented, and maybe the parent were more willing to talk.
The author begins with a similar pair: Leopold and Loeb. But they were young adults who killed to prove how smart they were, and were quite sane. The attempted killers in this book were mentally messed-up children, with Morgan more unbalanced than Anissa. It was understandable to treat the case in adult court rather than juvenile, but the downside was that mental health assistance was not given early on because of that.
The conditions of the pair in jail or in mental hospitals is definitely not conducive to improvement in their mental states. Anybody reading this book would not say that they got off easy by pleading insanity.
The other victims of the case are the families involved. The parents of all three had their lives ruined by this incident. Yes, maybe something could have been done early on to prevent the tragedy, but who would think such a horrific act would occur between girls who were friends?
The book can also be a warning to parents to pay attention to what their children say and read, especially related to the Internet. There's a lot of nonsense out there, and children don't have enough knowledge to separate fact from fiction.
- Reviewed in the United States on September 30, 2022I just finished Slenderman and loved it. It is well written and researched - it outlines the facts/story clearly and in a way that paints an overarching POV on how mental illness and the lack of acknowledgement & support had a hand in so many facets of this tragedy - while still adding in the some
personality/tone so it isn’t dry.
So many times in this book I found myself thinking: "what if?' at the various crossroads from parent/teacher interactions, choices the girls made, the legal/court systems rulings, etc. Hale's telling leaves you thinking well after you close the book- and for me, that's the best reading experience. Highly Recommend
- Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2022Okay...this book was pretty good. The history behind Slenderman was something I knew nothing about. Apparently, in 2014, a twelve year old girl named Morgan and her friend Anissa (also twelve) thought they had to kill a friend in order to protect their families from Slenderman. Thankfully, their victim survived the attack. The girls were tried as adults. Through the trial, we find out that Morgan has schizophrenia and that combined with the tale of Slenderman to produce the attempted murder. Anissa, her friend, had emotional issues and believed in what Morgan was telling her. These two troubled girls shed light on the issue of how the justice system handles the mentally ill. (Hint: It's not handled well!)
- Reviewed in the United States on March 11, 2024Hale provides an engrossing, thorough analysis of a tragedy that we all thought we understood but really didn’t before this book.
Top reviews from other countries
- T. NorrisReviewed in Canada on April 25, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars Great price!
I didn't read this yet, but the hardcover was sold for a great price (clearance maybe?). I picked up another copy to gift a friend also. This story will likely generate a bit of renewed interest, as one of the killers recently tried to get early release (denied).