The Stranger Beside Me (Revised and Updated): 20th Anniversary
by Ann Rule
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Book Summary Information
Author: Ann RuleEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2001-06-01
ISBN: 0451203267
Number of pages: 560
Publisher: Signet
Book Reviews of The Stranger Beside Me (Revised and Updated): 20th Anniversary
Book Review: Prince Charming and Bluebeard
Summary: 4 Stars
Ann Rule was a Seattle policewoman who turned to journalism, specializing in True Crime around the northwest coast. Of her many books, this is the only one where she had personal knowledge of the perfect son, law student, social worker, and "trusted friend". Rule started writing this book before she found out that the suspect in these serial killings was her friend and co-worker, Ted Bundy. [Was he the inspiration for "Hannibal Lecter"?] Rule says there was nothing in Ted's record that could predict his future (p.xi). Yet there were incidents in his behavior: suspicion of auto theft and burglary (p.12), rifling lockers and stealing from drunks (p.14). His first girlfriend believed Ted used people and took advantage of them (p.15); she was also out of his class. Ted had other disappointments (pp.16-17). But he returned to college and became an honor student in psychology. Ted told stories to gain sympathy from a Professor (p.20). [A sign of a manipulator.] But otherwise Ted seemd to have a bright future (p.21).
Ann Rule worked as a volunteer for the Seattle Crisis Clinic in 1971. Ted was one of the work-study students there. They both helped to save lives (p.25). Ted was helpful in his advice to Rule (p.27). Ted's slenderness disguised his physical strength (p.29); racquetball and bicycling. Rule admired him. Ted was a conservative Republican who believed in law and order; Rule never saw any anger (p.32). Ted had a "compartmentalized" life, moved in many circles where no one really knew much about him. Ted's relationship with Stephanie changed, due to Ted's bitterness. Did Ted court her so he could reject her as she had earlier rejected him (p.47)? She survived this and married someone else. After this, the first victim disappeared.
Rule's life continued, a single mother with four children, writing reports on cases for the police, then writing stories for publication (p.49). Rule was a Deputy Sheriff in many of the counties, and spent time with various units (p.50). After young girls disappeared, Rule believed the killer would be a violent man, someone let out of prison too soon (p.77). Ted had a letter or recommendation from the Governor of Washington (pp.106-107). His coworkers at the Dept of Emergency Services noted his resemblance to the "Ted" at Lake Sammamish (pp.108-109). So did others (p.110). The murders in the Seattle area ceased but new murders occurred in Utah, Ted's new home (Chapter 13). But Ted failed to abduct and kill a young woman; Ted impersonated a police detective to fool this victim! After this young woman started to disappear in Colorado; some of their bodies were found (pl143). Early one morning a Utah HP sergeant noticed a VW Beetle driving by; he followed and stopped this car, and arrested the driver for evading an officer, and possessing burglar tools. Now things began to fall inot pale, and Rule received a phone call from Ted (Chapter 16). Those who worked with Ted couldn't believe the charges (p.157). Rule wrote to Ted in jail, and received Ted's letters. [Rule doesn't say that her association with Ted provided a powerful competitive advantage for her book.] The divorced single mother who lived off and on with Ted admittted he would leave in the middle of the night for hours, often when the girls disappeared (p.166). The police checked Ted's credit card records and telephone bills. Ted had been in the area where girls disappeared (p.175). Prison psychiatrists found Ted to be "normal" (p0.217); but he was sober then. After his second escape Ted travelled to Tallahassee FL and attacked girls at the Chi Omega sorority. (Rule had pledged to this organization - was Ted sending her a message?) A police officer noted a car coming out of a parking lot early in the morning, followed and stopped it. The suspect resisted arrest, but Patrolman David Lee caught one of the Ten-Most-Wanted. Ted's murder spree was over (Chapter 34). The rest of this book end this story, with Rule's personal experience at the trial.
Ted's trial in Miami was televised live; was this a first? The bite marks on Lisa Levy's buttocks first linked a victim to Ted (p.397-398). Rule said Ted was found guilty becaase he fought against his defense lawyers (p.403).
Summary of The Stranger Beside Me (Revised and Updated): 20th Anniversary
Ann Rule was a writer working on the biggest story of her life, tracking down a brutal mass-murderer. Little did she know that Ted Bundy, her close friend, was the savage slayer she was hunting.The most fascinating killer in modern American history...Ann Rule has an extraordinary angle that makes The Stranger Beside Me as dramatic and chilling as a bedroom window shattering at midnight. (The New York Times)
Overwhelming. (The Houston Post)
A shattering story...carefully investigated, written with compassion but also with professional objectivity. (Seattle Times)
Not long ago, true crime writer Ann Rule recalls lying on an operating table. The anesthesiologist leaned over before putting her to sleep. "Ann," the anesthesiologist said softly, "tell me, what was Ted Bundy really like?" Despite meeting Florida's electric chair in 1989, the subject of Rule's bestselling book continues to haunt her. Rule and Bundy were friends. They met in 1971 at a Seattle crisis clinic, where they shared the late shift answering a suicide hotline. Their subsequent conversations, meetings, and letters spanned the rest of Bundy's life as he evolved into one of the century's most notorious serial killers. It's been 20 years since Rule first penned this chilling account. But the story--and her 2000 update--will still have readers reaching for their Xanax. No gratuitous gore here; just the basic, bone-chilling evidence. In fact, like a protective mother shielding us from horrors too awful to mention, Rule seems to avoid delving too deeply into crime scene descriptions. She devotes one paragraph in her new afterword to her discovery that Bundy engaged in necrophilia and returned to the scenes of his crimes to "line dead lips and eyes with garish makeup and to put blush on pale cheeks." She tells readers that John Hinckley, who shot Ronald Reagan, and David Berkowitz, the Son of Sam Killer, traded prison correspondences with Bundy. And she hints that Bundy's insatiable killer instincts may have started when he was a 14-year-old paperboy. (Ann Marie Burr, an 8-year-old girl on his route, mysteriously disappeared in the middle of the night and has never been found.) The skimpy update is over too soon, leaving readers wanting more and offering further proof of the public's never-ending fascination with serial killers. --Jodi Mailander Farrell
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