From Amazon for you to read - reviews of her book.
1.0 out of 5 stars Dull and Egocentric, Not a Good Combo, May 3, 2010
By feysidhe "feysidhe" (Mount Kisco, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
One of the hazards of an autobiography is that even a person who lives an exciting life may not be a good enough writer to transmit that excitement. On the other hand a biography written by a talented author can make even the most average life interesting.
Unfortunately, Pat Brown is not a talented author. Nor does she seem to have lived all that thrilling a life, despite being a self-taught, self-proclaimed profiler. This book consists of her alternately whining and boasting. She is always right, even though no one supports her, believes her or listens to her.
At the beginning of the book, when she is talking about the guy who stayed in her house, she telegraphs several things:
1) this is a woman who will never admit to being wrong
2) this is a woman who doesn't take responsibility for her own failures
3) this book is going to drive a thinking person crazy
She writes about how her husband didn't believe her that her boarder was a criminal and LONG before she mentions that they're now divorced, it's obvious she's going to say so. If she found all the stuff she says she found in this guy's room, the police should clearly have paid attention. But when she starts going into reasons why the case was never properly investigated (later in the book), she begins to give readers the impression that she may have a slight paranoid personality disorder.
The thing I was most hoping to get when I ordered this book was some sense of what an ordinary woman did that helped her to understand the various aspects of profiling. However, since none of Pat Brown's "cases" ever went to court, so that no hard evidence in the cases ever got examined by *actual professionals,* it's hard to take her seriously. Without reading 400 books, I already know more about blood spatter, weapons, physical capability, psychology and psychopathology than she displays. And I'd never expect anyone to hire me on as a profiler.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, September 26, 2010
By MED (Arizona) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
I was looking forward to reading this because of my interest in true crime and in profiling. While Ms. Brown does offer a view into the problems of an imperfect justice system, most of the book offers nothing more than graphic descriptions of brutal crimes that she has "profiled" without any of the crimes being solved as a result. Sorry, what's the point? Since reading this, I've seen her on television a couple of times and she struck me as more interested in self-promotion than as an expert profiler.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Underwhelming, May 4, 2010
By S. Jacobs "eyegor" (Northern Virginia) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
When I sat down to read this book, I was looking forward to finding out how a professional profiler works and to see them help bring criminals to justice. This book never quite delivers that.
Pat's life was profoundly affected when a girl was murdered in her town and the signs seemed to point to a boarder in her home. She set about to prove her suspicions to the police, but the boarder was never charged with the crime in spite of seeming very suspicious. Undaunted, she began self-training to be a criminal profiler. At this point of the book, I still had some hope that justice would be done and the girls murderer was uncovered. No such luck. Rather, she used every opportunity smirking at professional profilers and railing at the failed investigators, prosecutors and "the system".
The remainder of the book consists of "cases" that describe various crimes and "non-crimes" (eg suicides). In each case, none of the people she "fingers" as the culprit are charged with the crime. Frequently, she tries to profile cases without the cooperation of the police or even the families involved. In many cases, the cases are extremely old and the evidence isn't made available to her or has been lost or destroyed. She nevertheless manages to find the miscreant and in my opinion, borders on libel by saying that they did the crime without having any evidence to back it up.
When I write a review, I try to be as objective as possible and complete the entire book before beginning my review. About 2/3s of the way through the "cases", I began lamenting my choice of reading material, but still held out hope that she would manage to help obtain at least one conviction. That wasn't the case and as other reviewers have noted, it seemed to be more a case of her puffing up her reputation at the expense of other profilers (real ones who have real training and real convictions).
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1.0 out of 5 stars Rather Peculiar Book, May 3, 2010
By Skunk Tabby (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
Dear potential reader of this book: Before investing your time and money, ask yourself, "Do I wish to read the slightly paranoid, somewhat delusional, and definitely egotistical blathering of a so-called expert in profiling who never seems to have brought anyone to justice and who has questionable ethics in naming "suspects" that have never been charged, let alone convicted?" If the answer is no, don't buy this book.
How this woman hasn't been sued for slander is beyond me. If she's using pseudonyms, she doesn't say so, although a bit of googling didn't turn up anything under the aliases she may or may not have given. I certainly don't fault her for being self-taught, but she doesn't seem to have actually learned anything more than anyone else who's watched TV, except how to make wild guesses following that ever reliable "gut." And while she doesn't charge victims' families for her opinions, the families would be wise to keep in mind that you get what you pay for. And to any police departments or investigators thinking about hiring her, please ask her about her success rate. Has she ever testified in court? I'd love to know what it is myself. No one would expect a 100% conviction rate, but her's seems to be less than zero.
Unless you want to waste your time and money padding the author's ego and wallet, don't bother.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Silliness Personified, March 3, 2011
By L. Dash (Maryland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Kindle Edition)
It is amusing to read Pat Brown's attributes of the psychopathic personality, one of which is narcissism, when she herself is quite narcissistic. Oh, where would the world be without Ms Brown to solve the cold cases of the world when all police professionals around her are incompetents?
Criticism of personality traits aside, when I purchased this book, I did not know of Pat Brown's background, so expected this book to be insightful writing on criminal behavior. It isn't. Instead it is the ramblings of a well-intentioned enough, but not too knowledgeable person who believes her interest in the subject and offers of free help to families in crises has qualified her as a professional. Not surprisingly, the only thing that she has to offer is conjecture, so none of her research has lead to a solution in the cases she writes about. Don't waste your money on this tripe.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your time., February 5, 2011
By A Customer - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Kindle Edition)
I made it through four chapters and gave up. Pat Brown describes several cases and criminals but never shows evidence of her "profiles" actually solving any crimes.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your time and money!, July 29, 2010
By Kate Farmer - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
I found this book very boring ..I'll make a quick comment..not at all factual..written by someone very self serving..egotistical..I couldn't finish it..I got the impression that everyone else is just plain ignorant but the author enough said!
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1.0 out of 5 stars Conjecture is not science, June 10, 2010
By G. Dannunzio "CHIRONJ" (new brunswick, nj) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
Ms. Brown may have a degree in Criminal Justice, but she is not a psychologist or scientific researcher in human factors. She is a great self promoter. I have to believe in her mind her TV appearances and radio show has qualified her as a premier profiler. This is clearly not true.
I wish I read through some of the other reviews. The beginning of the book is interesting but goes downhill from there.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Utter waste / Scam by a self-promoting circus barker, May 10, 2011
By D. Davis (New York, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
I've never written a negative review on Amazon before, but I'd be doing a disservice to the public by letting this one go. This book is BAD. It's nothing but the rantings of an egotist desperately seeking self-promotion.
After being annoyed at having wasted my time starting to read it, I checked out Ms. Brown on the internet. She has no degree in psychology or anything else that would qualify her as a "profiler." She named herself one and got on a TV a couple of times. She's a scam, a hollow impersonator whose existence is dedicated to self-promotion. The one case I saw her write on, the West Memphis Three, is illustrative - she gets all the facts wrong, ignores the forensics, and declares the West Memphis Three guilty in spite of the fact that the Arkansas Supreme Court just ordered new hearings for them.
She's a clown - apparently her looks got her on TV years ago, but they're going, too and as people look into her more and more they see that she - and her book - are nothing but ignorant self-promotion.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Apallingly Bad Book!, July 12, 2010
By A Reader - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: The Profiler: My Life Hunting Serial Killers and Psychopaths (Hardcover)
Let me start out by saying I've never written a negative review of a book before in my life. After all, tastes can be subjective, so why ruin the reading experience of someone else who might love a book that didn't exactly send me? However, in the case of The Profiler by Pat Brown, I truly feel I need to warn the public. This book is apallingly BAD. The author is relentlessly egotistical and self-promoting, has NO insight into how vapid she sounds 80% of the time, and on top of that, she's outrageously ungenerous toward experienced, law-enforcement officials who spend their time day-in and day-out in the trenches dodging criminals' bullets instead of on radio and television talk shows! I didn't learn ANYTHING from this book except that Pat Brown has an overwhelming need to become famous. If you want to learn more about sociopathic personality disorder or criminal profiling, please look elsewhere--or better yet, buy a seasoned, big-city street cop a donut and a cup of coffee and truly listen to what he or she has to say. Those people have seen it all and can run circles around wannabes like Pat Brown! And when you're done with your donut and coffee, give the cop a hug and a hearty THANK YOU for doing his/her job without the ridiculous self-absorption of Pat Brown. [quote]
So now we know why she's so very desperate to get the reviews 'reversed' by having her sycophants post up positive ones. As far as I can see, the negative reviews are all from the American Amazon site, NOT from anyone in the UK supporting the McCanns, which is what she is claiming. Some of the comments re her personality etc are very revealing, and this is just a sample. She really is a money-grabbing, small minded scammer, isn't she? A con artist, to be exact.