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Issue Details: First known date: 2006... 2006 Killing For Pleasure : The Definitive Story of the Snowtown Serial Murders
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'The bestselling account of one of South Australia's worst series of crimes - the bodies in the barrels.

'A disused bank vault holding eight dismembered bodies immersed in barrels of acid. Two bodies buried in a suburban backyard. A further two found in the bush. Such was the findings of one of South Australia's most horrific murder trials.

'Informed by material never seen before - an interview with Bunting's last lover Elizabeth Harvey, and with the Crown's key eye-witness James Vlassakis and with details of the torture and crimes not previously released - this is a tensely woven and microscopic examination of tawdry lives and tragic deaths.

'Four men who tortured and killed for fun, for power. Four men who kept each other's dark secrets for years. By the time the police investigation concluded, the story had invited comparison with the nightmare of Rosemary and Fred West, the British House of Horrors. Details of what the killers did to their victims before and after their deaths were deemed so depraved that suppression orders were in place throughout the trial. But the killers were not insane. They made deliberate choices to kill and lived in a culture of complete anarchy, sadistic violence, deviance and chaos.

'Journalist and author Debi Marshall explores the killers' psychopathic makeup in minute and harrowing detail. She charts the victims' exposure to generational paedophilia, incest, unemployment and hopelessness. Marshall covers the exhaustive trials and interviews the lawyers who ran them. Through interviews, she captures the voices of the victim's families and examines the police and forensic investigation and then wades into the social structure that spawned the people in this story.

'This book was used as a primary source for the acclaimed Australian feature film, Snowtown.'

Source : publisher's blurb

Adaptations

form y separately published work icon Snowtown The Snowtown Murders Shaun Grant , ( dir. Justin Kurzel ) Australia : Warp Films Australia , 2010 Z1679026 2010 single work film/TV crime horror

Sixteen-year-old Jamie feels isolated by the poverty of his surroundings, his lack of a father figure, and his mother's preoccupation with his younger, more demanding brothers. So when he falls in with the charismatic and much older John, he is slowly drawn into John's world of homophobia, violence, and murder.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • c
      Australia,
      c
      :
      Random House Australia ,
      2006 .
      image of person or book cover 8060953153570493851.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 432pp.p.
      Reprinted: 2 May 2011 E-book
      Note/s:
      • Published 3 April 2006
      ISBN: 9781740512480, 9781742744223 (ebk)

Works about this Work

Voice For the Dead Sally Glaetzer , 2016 single work column
— Appears in: The Advertiser , 2 April 2016; (p. 14)
Voice For the Dead Sally Glaetzer , 2016 single work column
— Appears in: The Advertiser , 2 April 2016; (p. 14)
Last amended 7 Oct 2020 14:48:27
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