Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published May 2006
560 pages
Genre: True Crime
Publication Information
In the summer of 1977, Terri Jentz and her Yale roommate took a cross-country bike trip. As they lay sleeping in the central Oregon desert, a man in a pickup truck deliberately ran over their tent and proceeded to attack them with an axe. The horrific crime was reported in newspapers across the country, but no one was ever arrested. Fifteen years later, Jentz returns to the small town where she was nearly murdered and makes an extraordinary discovery: the violence of that night is as present for the community as it is for her. Shockingly, many say they know who did it, and he is living freely in their midst.
"Her story is chilling and will enthrall true crime readers." - Publishers Weekly.
"Her overlong account should have been substantially trimmed, and the frequent passages of pop psychology are amateurish." - Kirkus Reviews.
"Part true crime, part memoir, part a profile of a stone-cold sociopath, and part an exploration of violence and its effect on people and communities, Jentz's book is tough to read-and even tougher to put down." - USA Today.
This information about Strange Piece of Paradise was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Terri Jentz is a screenwriter and lives in Los Angeles. Strange Piece of Paradise is her first book.
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