The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream: The Hunt for a Victorian Era Serial Killer

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A tour de force of storytelling.Louise Penny, #1New York Timesbestselling author of the Chief Inspector Gamache series

Jobbs excellent storytelling makes the book a pleasure to read.TheNew York Times Book Review

When a doctor does go wrong, he is the first of criminals, Sherlock Holmes observed during one of his most baffling investigations. He has nerve and he has knowledge. In the span of fifteen years, Dr. Thomas Neill Cream murdered as many as ten people in the United States, Britain, and Canada, a death toll with almost no precedent. Poison was his weapon of choice. Largely forgotten today, this villain was as brazen as the notorious Jack the Ripper.

Structured around the doctors London murder trial in 1892, when he was finally brought to justice, The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream exposes the blind trust given to medical practitioners, as well as the flawed detection methods, bungled investigations, corrupt officials, and stifling morality of Victorian society that allowed Dr. Cream to prey on vulnerable and desperate women, many of whom had turned to him for medical help.

Dean Jobb transports readers to the late nineteenth century as Scotland Yard traces Dr. Creams life through Canada and Chicago and finally to London, where new investigative tools called forensics were just coming into use, even as most police departments still scoffed at using science to solve crimes. But then, most investigators could hardly imagine that serial killers existedthe term was unknown. As the Chicago Tribune wrote, Dr. Creams crimes marked the emergence of a new breed of killer: one who operated without motive or remorse, who murdered simply for the sake of murder. For fans of Erik Larsons The Devil in the White City, all things Sherlock Holmes, or the podcast My Favorite Murder, The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream is an unforgettable true crime story from a master of the genre.

Reviews

One of the Most Anticipated Books of 2021:
The New York Times Book Review * BuzzFeed * CNN* CrimeReads* Book Riot

One of IndieWire's 10 Best Gifts for True Crime Fans
One ofThe Washington Post's "50 Notable Works of Nonfiction"
One of CrimeReads' "Best True Crime Books of 2021"

Jobb recounts Creams life and evokes the societal attitudes that allowed him to kill: the blind faith placed in doctors, the power imbalance between Cream and the people who sought his care.
TheNew York Times

A deeply absorbing account of the life and deeds of one of the Rippers earliest successors . . . An admirable piece of work, a model for its kind.
The Wall Street Journal

[Dr. Thomas Neill Cream] will hauntingly occupy a space in your nightmares after you read of his life and crimes in The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream. An extraordinarily well-researched and arrestingly written work . . . this is a book that grabs you from its first sentence, weaving a suspenseful tale and taking readers on a grand, if gruesome, historical journey.
Chicago Tribune

Jobb . . . re-creates Creams heartless life in short, highly dramatic chapters.
The Washington Post

If you've been hunting for your next true crime addiction this summer, Dean Jobb's The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream has it all: a serial-killer doctor, corrupt leaders, and a ground-breaking investigation by Scotland Yard, all within the spellbinding setting of London circa 1892.
Elle

True crime fans will want to pick up Dean Jobbs engrossing account of Thomas Neill Cream . . . Jobb builds Creams world in vivid, transportive detail; I had a lot of fun being swept away.
BuzzFeed,28 Summer Books to Get Excited About

A must for true crime fans.
CNN

A tour de force of storytelling. One of the best books Ive read this year. Dean Jobb breathes new life into Cream's victimswho they were, where and how they livedall the while blending in thorny issues of policing, of the fictional detectives being created, of the other serial killers on the loose. This book is both chilling and thrilling.
Louise Penny, #1New York Timesbestselling author of the Chief Inspector Gamache series

The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream is a macabre, utterly suspenseful true crime thriller about a forgotten madman every bit as cunning and evil as Jack the Ripper. Dean Jobb combines scholarship with a breakneck narrative so relentless it kept me up all night. Warning: Read with the lights on.
Abbott Kahler,New York Timesbestselling author (as Karen Abbott) ofThe Ghosts of Eden Park

The story of the infamous poisoner Thomas Neill Cream is so many thingshorrifying, fascinating, andinsightful, a portrait of late 19th-century police work at a time when the idea of the professionaldetective was just starting to take shape. And in this vivid and compelling book, Dean Jobb doesfull justice to that story.
Deborah Blum, New York Timesbestselling author ofThe PoisonersHandbook

[Jobb] creates a nuanced portrait of Cream thats much more chilling than Mr. Hyde.
BookPage

Masterful . . . True crime doesnt get any better than this.
Booklist

[A] fascinating read.
Oxygen.com, July Book Club Selection

Chilling and fascinating . . . Jobbs true crime stories are not to be missed.
CrimeReads

Jobbs extensive research pays off in a true crime masterpiece that will easily sit alongsideThe Devil in the White City.
Publishers Weekly, starred review

Jobb richly embellishes his grim central tale with carefully researched setting, detail, and social mores of the late Victorian era, elegantly contrasted with his eponymous fiend, Thomas Neill Cream . . . A vivid, engaging revival of a forgotten Victorian villain.
Kirkus Reviews

An illuminating, if frightening, book . . . Jobb handles this hideous yet compelling story so well . . . An absorbing and grim account, The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream is a gripping addition to the true crime genre.
Bookreporter.com

Jobb uses Creams spree to illuminate the eras surgical and policing practices, and despite Creams monstrousness, Jobbs storytelling makes the book a pleasure to read.
The Week

[A] fascinating read.
Oxygen.com

The graphically told tale of a notorious 19th-century slayer Impressive.
Washington Independent Review of Books

Jobb does a masterful job of following the investigation, which ranged from England to the United States to Canada, and of presenting Dr. Cream not merely as a murderer, but as a complex, unstable, and deeply fascinating individual. True crime doesnt get any better than this.
Booklist

Jobbs research is excellent . . . [His] compelling account of Creams reign of terror will appeal to readers interested in Jack the Ripper or Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper.
Library Journal

Engrossing . . . An informative and entertaining true crime text.
Foreword Review

Jobb captures the hypocrisy, class differences, and gender inequality of the times in an extensively researched non-fiction telling of the forgotten nineteenth century serial killer Dr. Thomas Neill Cream . . . Both grim and hard to put down.
Southern Bookseller Review

Dean Jobbs meticulous research is evident on every page of his gripping study of the extraordinary serial killer Doctor Cream, a nineteenth century monster of iniquity whose homicidal career was trulystranger than fiction.
Martin Edwards, author ofMortmain Halland the Lake District Mysteries

Dean Jobb has produced another mesmerizing feat of historicalstorytelling.The Case of theMurderous Dr. Creamvividly recreates the career of one of the most audaciousand deadlycriminals in history.
Gary Krist, New York Times bestselling author ofEmpire of Sin and The Mirage Factory

Tense, atmospheric, and effortlessly readable,The Case of the Murderous Dr. Creamhas all the sinisterelegance of a hansom cab emerging from a late Victorian London smog.
Paul Willetts,author ofKing Con

Deeply researched and rich in grisly detail,The Case of the Murderous Dr. Creamfuses theblow-by-blow efforts to catch a serial killer with the larger picture of crime and detection inthe late nineteenth century. A fine piece of social history as well as an extraordinary story, itengrossed me right up to its deeply satisfying conclusion.
Charlotte Gray, author of elevennonfiction bestsellers, includingThe Massey MurderandMurdered Midas

A brilliant evocation of an age and a fascinating dissection of a serial killer's crimes. Dean Jobb is a first-rate storyteller and historical detective. A real page-turner.
Lindsey Fitzharris, author of The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine

Corruption, madness, murder:Dr. Creamhas it all. This is aspectacular and absorbing tale, meticulously reported and vividly told. An enthralling page-turner.
Jonathan Eig, author ofGet Capone: The Secret Plot that Captured Americas Most Wanted Gangster

The definitive retelling of a story about a devious doctor, the dogged investigators who hunted him, and the murders that shocked the world. Dr. Creams story comes to life in Jobbs spellbinding tale."
Kate Winkler Dawson,authorAmerican Sherlock: Murder, Forensics, and the Birth of American CSI

A tour de force of research,The Case of the Murderous Dr. Creamconjures an erawhenpoisoners roamed the earthand police seemed powerless to stop them.
MargalitFox, author ofConan Doyle for the Defense

An exciting whodunit . . . Jobb also does the unusual in true crime: he describes in detail the lives of Creams victims. The scholarship he employed to tell this story is staggering . . . the numbing regard and treatment of women in Victorian times especially of unmarried pregnant, widowed and abandoned women tugs at the heart.
Winnipeg Free Press

A must-read... historically rich and shockingly poignant, Jobbs text is not one to miss.
True Crime Index

First-rate creative non-fiction [and] very hard to put down . . . Crime buffs are going to motor through this book.
Saltwire.com

Author Bio

Dean Jobb is an award-winning author and journalist and a professor at the University of Kings College in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he teaches in the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction program. He is the author of eight previous book