Review: Dangerous Ground: My Friendship with a Serial Killer by M. William Phelps

I chose to read this book for Non-Fiction November. I didn't know at the time who the serial killer the title refers to was until I started reading it. The author does not just write true crime novels but he also produces true-crime docuseries such as Dark Minds. While filming this series he used Keith Hunter Jesperson as an advisor under the pseudonym of "Raven". It was while filming this series that the author became "friends" with Jesperson. I say it this way because the author was just using him and was not really friends with him.

I wanted to recommend this book because being that this is based on interviews with the Happyface Killer that this may be the best source for information regarding his case. I know that other books were written about him, and one was even written by the killer's daughter. At one point in the interview process, Jesperson admits to the author that not all of the information in his daughter's book is accurate, and the other book written about his case is full of embellishments and falsely fed information from Happyface. Jesperson admitted to providing false information to make himself seem more interesting. Now I will state that Happyface admits to the author later on that he is a notorious liar and that not everything he says should be believed. But I think this will be the closest to the real story as one can get.

There are some bonus content things such as Jesperson talks about his first victim and how he didn't really want to become a serial killer. Plus the author kind of persuades him to help solve one of his Jane Doe's which the technique they used was very interesting and I will not spoil it here.

Some of the negatives about the book and why I chose to give this a standard rating of 3 out of 5 stars on Goodreads. The author for some reason chose to use this book as a way to analyze why he is into true crime and to try and rationalize some of his life choices regarding the death of his sister-in-law and his older brother's heroin addiction. These personal matters I felt did not belong in this book, and honestly, he should have written them as a separate piece if he really felt it necessary to share with the world. So as a reader you have to slog through some of his personal issues time and again as you read this. I found his personal family history to be kind of a pain, but they are short sections and he gets right back into the interviews with Happyface.

But overall I found this to be an interesting book about the Happyface serial killer and his case. Down below is a link to purchase a copy of this book for yourself. and if you live outside the US I have another link that offers Free Worldwide shipping and the same discounts.