Average Rating: 
Rating:  - A Waste of 28 Bucks!
Fortunately, they weren't my 28 bucks. Borrowed my sister's copy of this book. Not history, not fiction. Just pure exploitive, gratuitously gossipy character assassination. Cornwell is fortunate that Sickert has no living heirs to silence this destruction of an artist's reputation.No footnotes, a lot of opinion and little else to persuade the reader of Cornwell's illogical conclusion. And, even if Cornwell could convince her audience (and she doesn't) that Sickert authored the Ripper letters, it is still a huge deductive leap to assume that the author of the letters was the killer. I was also shocked to learn that Cornwell bought some of Sickert's paintings and destroyed them in the failed attempt to extract forensic evidence. Cornwell is not a scientist, art historian nor historian. She should stick with her brand of weakly written fiction. Do I have to give it even one star?
Rating:  - An Interesting Read, but not a Definitive ID
Walter Sickert was an interesting painter and case study, but despite the estimated $6 million author Patricia Cornwell reportedly spent investigating the Jack the Ripper mystery, no smoking gun is revealed in these pages. Cornwell, an author with previous crime lab experience who has gained fame and fortune with best selling novels about the exploits of forensic pathologist Kay Scarpetta, provides potential DNA evidence to be used against Sickert to link him to the grisly Jack the Ripper murders, but as critics have noted, it is far from conclusive. Two important factors need to be remembered, 1) scores of letters purporting to have come from Jack the Ripper were received and reviewed by police, with most dismissed as coming from cranks; 2) Sickert was cremated, rendering the prospect of any conclusive DNA finding linking him to the killings virtually inconceivable.The book has merit, however, on several fronts, just as long as one is circumspect about drawing too much on sometimes fragmentary conclusions concerning Sickert. Victorian England is revealed in fascinating detail, along with the shadowy world of London's East End, Whitechapel, where the Jack the Ripper murders occurred. Sickert is a fascinating figure, with his bizarre artistic genius and ability to hobnob with leading figures of late nineteenth century London. He was the apprentice of the legendary Boston expatriate who took London society by storm and remained to prosper, artist, journalist and bon vivant James McNeill Whistler. While Sickert's artistic tastes revealed ghoulishness, the desire to paint luckless prostitutes with their hapless customers, it is understandable that he might draw attention as a potential Ripper possibility. He also was known to take walks in the dangerous Whitechapel area in late evenings. These are attention drawing elements, and perhaps render one a suspect, but it takes much more to pin the crimes on Sickert and establish that he indeed was the Ripper. Due to the fact that so much time has elapsed since the murders were committed over a century ago, it is understandable that interest abounds with a number of prospects being considered. It is also understandable, and indeed likely, that after all the time that has elapsed that speculation will continue to abound without the Jack the Ripper mystery ever being solved.
Rating:  - Case Not Closed...Still, It's Worth A Look...
Unlike many of the other reviewers, I think her presentation of the facts was fair. She always let the reader know when she was theorizing, and the evidence presented was compelling. She consults with experts when needed to support her conclusions. The information was fascinating to me, although she does seem to wander a bit in her presentation, especially in the last few chapters. Her evidence wouldn't prove his guilt in a court of law, but Cornwell wasn't attempting to do that. All the witnesses are dead, and much of the evidence has disappeared. She does however, build a strong circumstantial case against Sickert, and the facts do point strongly to him. People ARE convicted on circumstantial evidence if the overall weight of the evidence is overwhelming. Do I think Walter Sickert is the Ripper? Probably...but "case closed" is a little too optimistic. Definitely worth reading.
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