Murderland: Crime and Bloodlust in the Time of Serial Killers

What makes a murderer? Pulitzer winner Fraser (Prairie Fires) makes a convincing case for arsenic and lead poisoning as contributing factors in this eyebrow-raising account. Fraser, who was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest, where smelters belted out poison for decades and a proliferation of serial killers in the 1970s and ’80s earned the region the nickname “America’s Killing Fields,” marries a poignant memoir of her Washington State childhood with a vivid catalog of crimes by Ted Bundy, the Green River Killer, and others. Throughout, she forges links between ballooning 20th-century crime statistics and declining health outcomes due to pollution, noting that the so-called “golden age” of serial killers came to an end in the ’90s as leaded gasoline was banned, smelters shut down due to decreasing profits, and the Environmental Protection Agency stepped up pollution controls. While it initially sounds far-fetched when, for instance, Fraser links brutal violence on Mexico’s borders—where 500 women were murdered between 1993 and 2011—to a rise in unregulated factory towns, her methodical research and lucid storytelling argue persuasively for linking the health of the planet to the safety of its citizens. This is a provocative and page-turning work of true crime. Agent: Don Fehr, Trident Media Group. (June)