A Light in the Dark: Surviving More than Ted Bundy
By (Author) Kathy Kleiner Rubin
By (author) Emilie Le Beau Lucchesi
Chicago Review Press
Chicago Review Press
8th February 2024
United States
General
Non Fiction
Gender studies: women and girls
Biography: general
True crime: serial killers and murderers
True stories of heroism, endurance and survival
B
Hardback
304
Width 152mm, Height 228mm, Spine 25mm
598g
THE FIRST BOOK BY A CONFIRMED SURVIVOR OF TED BUNDY, AND THE ONLY MEMOIR TO CHALLENGE THE POPULAR NARRATIVE OF BUNDY AS A HANDSOME KILLER WHO CHARMED HIS VICTIMS INTO TRUSTING HIM
In January 1978, I slept in my bed at the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University as Ted Bundy stalked nearby.
He grabbed an oak log from a stack of firewood, slipped through a back door with a broken padlock, and headed upstairs.He began twisting doorknobs. Room 9 was open, and he quietly and quickly killed one of my sleeping sorority sisters. Across the hall, he found another unlocked door and murdered again. Then, he turned the knob to my bedroom and found it was open. I remember the attack vividly. Bundy bashed me once in the head with the log and then attacked my roommate. He heard me moaning and came to finish me off. He never let his victims live. But he stopped suddenly when a bright light filled the room. He fled the sorority house and the light disappeared.
Bundy wasnt my first brush with death, and he wasnt my last. Ive long been a survivor. I was born into a Cuban American family in 1957 in Florida. I had a happy childhood until I received my first death sentence at the age of thirteen. Physicians werent sure why I was always so exhausted and running a low-grade fever. The prognosis was grim after my left kidney started to fail. Then, a physician from Cuba saved my life with a surprise diagnosislupusand treatment plan: chemotherapy. I endured chemotherapy again in my early thirties when I was diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer.
This is my story of surviving three death sentences and finding love and happiness along the way. I was saved by a bright light, and I hope my story is one for people who are experiencing their own dark times. I am a victim, but I am also a survivor, and I want to speak up for all the women and girls whom Bundy murdered.
He has become a legend, and our voices have been muted or ignored. Its time we were heard.
Kathy Kleiner Rubin is a motivational speaker who specializes in survivor impact. Since 2018, Kleiner Rubin has been sharing her story with audiences eager to hear of her courage and survival. She is a sought after speaker who has spoken to universities, law enforcement agencies, forensic nursing organizations, and true crime conventions. Kleiner Rubin has given dozens of interviews to the country's top news agencies including CBS News, 48 Hours, 20/20, USA Today, CNN, and Newsweek. She has also been interviewed in Vanity Fair, Cosmopolitan, and People. Kleiner Rubin lives in South Florida with her husband and dog.
Emilie Le Beau Lucchesi is the author of Ugly Prey and This Is Really War. She is a regular contributor to Discover magazine and her work has appeared in the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Atlantic, and the nation's top newspapers. She lives in the Chicago area with her husband and three dogs.