Inside the Mind of a Killer
by Jean-Francois Abgrall
Profile $130
In January 1994, Francis Heaulme, the 'man from nowhere', France's most notorious serial killer, was sentenced to 20 years for the murder of Aline Peres. He has since been accused of at least 40 other killings and is suspected of hundreds more. Senior detective Jean-Francois Abgrall, who caught him, details the investigation, from the discovery of the first body on a beach to Heaulme's trial. Abgrall writes in prose so dry you can imagine him standing up in court and reading it out of his notebook, but he shows what real police work involves. Through a combination of patience, skill and instinct, Abgrall got inside the head of the killer to track him down. He also reveals a chilling intimacy that developed between the criminal and the policeman. As well as having similar first names, the pair were born only a few days apart.