Hearts of Darkness
Serial Killers, the Behavioral Science Unit, and My Life as a Woman in the FBI
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3.8 • 17 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
For fans of Mindhunter, Criminal Minds, and My Favorite Murder, a riveting memoir of a trailblazing woman’s life hunting down serial killers as one of the first female profilers of the FBI Behavioral Sciences Unit and the real-life model for Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs.
“Jana Monroe is the single most influential woman to ever serve in the FBI.” —Joe Navarro, bestselling author of What Every BODY Is Saying
Jana Monroe was no ordinary cop. One of the first analysts—and, at the time, the only female agent—in the world-renowned FBI Behavioral Sciences Unit at Quantico, she consulted on more than 850 homicide cases, including infamous serial killers Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, Edmund Kemper, and Aileen Wuornos. Monroe was also the model for Clarice Starling in the movie version of The Silence of the Lambs; she even helped train Jodie Foster for her Oscar-winning role. Monroe’s later years found her dealing with the aftermath of Columbine, heading up the FBI’s post-9/11 investigation in Las Vegas, and much more.
In Hearts of Darkness, Monroe steps out from the shadows to tell the story of her astonishing life in shaping law enforcement and intelligence analysis. Monroe explores the cases that have stayed with her, breaking down victimology, offering new insight into the minds of serial killers, and discussing the psychological toll of the job and the obstacles she faced as a woman in the male-dominated Bureau. This is a gripping, sometimes gruesome, and always remarkable memoir of an unparalleled life and career spent chasing the monsters among us.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this fascinating debut, Monroe shares how she rose in the FBI's ranks and became the inspiration for the character of Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs. Ever since she was a child in 1960s Long Beach, Calif., Monroe longed to work in law enforcement, but as a petite blonde, the road wasn't easy: she lacked role models ("I would have done better to search for Amelia Earhart's remains") and chafed against the old boys' club atmosphere of police departments. When she scored an interview with the FBI in the 1980s after growing dissatisfied with her policing assignments in Southern California, she was called into a "special joint interview" with her then husband to "make sure he supported" her ambitions. He didn't, and attempted to dissuade Monroe from joining, but she divorced him and took the job. The stories Monroe shares of her 22 years in the FBI are thrilling, frightening, and occasionally amusing (like the time she and a colleague went charging into a hotel room to arrest a suspect at the same time—and got stuck in the doorway). In sharp, no-nonsense prose, Monroe describes delving into the psyches of such killers as Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and finding love with a fellow agent, with whom she survived the 1992 FBI siege at Ruby Ridge. Readers interested in criminology will devour this.
Customer Reviews
Couldn’t get Past Page 200
I’ve read many books from the FBI’s BSU and this is by far the worst. This book is all about how this fearless woman overcome incredible obstacles and sexism and succeeded while leaving her contemporaries stunned. I get that women used to face obstacles and it wasn’t fair, but we should all be thankful that warriors such as the author crushed them all. Dr. Anne Burgess was at BSU long before this author and wrote about these experiences in the background without shoving it down the reader’s throats. Her book was excellent. This one not so much. But at least we learn what a hero the author was and how she met so many celebrities who were more like peers than anything else. Yawn.