For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb, and the Murder That Shocked Jazz Age Chicago

Samara AttridgeAP Language12-19-14Per. 3For the Thrill of It Book ReviewMurder is a hot topic when it comes to common TV and movie themes, but Hollywood tends to focus on figuring out who the murder is. The thing that sets this book apart from the rest of its nonfiction murder genre is from the first chapter we (the readers) already know who the criminals are. The author Simon Baatz (who usually writes stories on medicine and science) did not focus on dropping hints throughout the text and using suspects to entice the reader to continue reading. Instead Baatz gives you every piece of the case and later shocks you with the reasoning behind the murders. By doing this he takes away some of the emotional impact and leans more toward the phycology behind why people murder in the first place.The brutal murder of 1924 in Chicago will forever be engraved in the memories of the Franks family. Their son Bobby Franks was taken off the streets while walking home, the same thing he always did after school. His parents Flora Franks and Jacob Franks at the time had no idea that they would never see one of their youngest boys ever again. An emotion that Baatz expresses by describing n great detail how the Franks family as individuals reacted to the events that unfolded during that never-ending nightmare. According to Baatz, Mrs. Franks loved her sons "assertiveness, his independent spirit, his ambition," (Baatz 5).To commit such a crime to another human being you would naturally assume that the criminal has to be deranged and clinically insane. The most disturbing and interesting aspect to the book is that the murders Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb showed no signs of being deranged. Both Leopold and Loeb, had no problems telling right from wrong and were perceived to be very intelligent. It turns out Loeb was the smarter of the two, he knew Leopold's weaknesses and used them to keep Leopold from disagreeing with him. The scarcest thought created by this book is that they could have literally gotten away with murder. John Steele Gordon said it best in his review of For the Thrill of It for the New York Times when he said; "Together they formed a sort of yin and yang of evil"(Gordon).Baatz does a very good job of taking the reader back to the 1920's. He also has a way of keeping the reader confused, waiting for a reason and an explanation that would explain how these teenagers could bring themselves to murder a young boy. This book is astonishing because it uses real facts to keep you intrigued and always wanting to read the next page. The story of why Bobby Franks was murdered will forever leave audiences amazed and with questions.

Such a sadness for the victims family. Such unnecessary evil for 2 feeling superior, arrogant, rich kids wanting a thrill, and thumbing their noses at society. They should have had the death penalty. One justly murdered in prison w the second released, married and lived a content life in Puerto Rico. That is not justice. The death penalty is biblically supported. An eye for an eye. Evil is to be removed from society so it does not grow through influence. It shows how anesthetized sociopaths are to the pain of others. I grieved for the heartbreak of the boys parents to have had their child so flippantly murdered. This case haunts. The book is good the story and case so sad.

I've been reading several historical true crime/famouse case books lately. This is, I believe, the fourth one in a row that I've read. It was the highest rated eBook option that came up in my search for a book on the Leopold and Loeb case, so I just paid for it real quick and started in. I knew the gist of the story, but was interested to learn much more.However this book is definitely inferior to all the others I've read recently. Just not as interesting, with all the period details and color and thorough researching that you come to expect from these types of non-fiction.(As an aside that has nothing to do with the author, normally in Kindle books, you can tap on the foot note number and get a little popup of what the footnote says, but this book doesn't do that, alas. I'm not going to keep switching back and forth manually for multiple times per page, so I guess I'll never know.)It reads as though there are certain aspects of this case that the author happened to find more detail on than other aspects. And the aspects that he didn't come into a lot of info own, he just brushed past.So there is a VERY small part at the start of the book that deals with the victim. But for the most part, he's treated as more of an object that something happens to--not a fleshed out human being who is the victim of this remarkable crime.Then, there is a medium sized chapter that tells us more about the perpetrators, a little bit of their family history and childhood, but mostly just a retracing of their college years and 'friendship.'The police investigation leading up to the arrest, as well the interrogation is almost completely absent. It's just a very shallow brush pass that there were some clues, and then days of interrogation, and anyhow then they were chaged, don't worry about it.THENNNN there is a VERY lengthy and boring middle section of the book that entails a long biography of both of the opposing council (Clarence Darrow and Robert Crowe), various cases they were involved with, philosophies, history of politics and corruption in Chicago... just on and on of things that have precious little to do with the murder trial you sat down to read about.There's a very boring and difficult slog through court transcripts of medical and psychological test results (from the 20s remember), that also feels like filler because the book wasn't long enough, so rather than try to think more about how to add more depth and interest to this moment in American history, he just decided to copy and paste a bunch of actual transcripts in as 'dialogue' and call it good. It took me forever to get through this part of the book and was the closest I came to just giving up.As a reader of a lot of true crime, mostly historical cases, I appreciate the color and interest added to the setting of the story. And while I do expect to get some background and color of the main figures involved in the story, I'm not super interested in an entire long chapter of multiple lawyers involved. This feels like filler, because the author couldn't get more details to fill out the case so just stuffed a bunch of stuff about the lawyers in.The pacing of the story also seemed odd. When I was 25% into the book, I thought it could have ended within a few pages and essentially been a complete story. And so I was mystified that I still have 60-70% more of the book still to read (counting for footnotes). I hoped there would be twists and turns and context that I didn't see coming... but it was filled out very boringly, in my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

A fascinating story meticulously researched and with a great narrative this book held my attention until the very last page.

I thought it dragged a little. I also felt there was a lot of overlap in the information provided given that the book is broken down into different sections. For instance, one section will cover one of the lawyers and their backstory. Then, the next section will go into detail about something that happened in court and will go over some of the same details just presented. I also felt like there had to have been some dramatization in it, given that some passages in the book actually wrote things about how people were feeling in a particular moment, like a witness was thinking this to themselves or feeling this during questioning. Well, how would the author know that sort of thing? I know that he could have asked the person involved how they felt in that moment, but it was rarely attributed to research or an interview so it seemed like the author taking some liberties. All in all, not a bad book. A little long and drawn out though.

It's coming close to 100 years since this horrific crime was committed, and there have been many books, plays and movies based on it, yet I really didn't know that much about the story until I read this. The author wrote this account with the aid of a mountain of research, so it is thorough. My one criticism is that I think it is overly long (560 pg) because it includes comprehensive background information on the many lawyers, doctors, psychiatrists and politicians involved in the criminal case.

A really fascinating case and a well written book. The author spends considerable time discussing neurology vs psycho analysis and how these were applied to the case on both sides, but it is never boring. It seems pretty clear from the book that these two young men were disturbed, but I think it is hard not to believe that the ultimate verdict in the case was a mistake. There is a lot of what some people might think is superfluous detail (for example about a page and a half is devoted to a Michigan football game for no other reason than that is what the students had been celebrating the night Leopold and Loeb had stolen a typewriter from his old fraternity house), but for the most part the details enhance the narrative and make the study of these two more deep and interesting. If you enjoy these types of courtroom dramas like I do, it is worth reading this book. Would definitely recommend.

Great, in depth book about the crime and a detailed account about the trail. I read it in two days, it was so riveting.