6 april 2020 | rd.com
fromtop:^joleenzubek.matthewcohenReader’s Digest
DEAR READER
A
few months ago, I became
enthralled by a podcast series
so dark I hesitate to recom-
mend it to you. Every commute for
days, Root of Evil filled my car with
the voices of two sisters, Rasha and
Yvette, as they uncovered four gen-
erations of terrifying secrets within
their clan, the Hodels.
I’ll spare you the details here, some
of which (only some, thankfully)
you will learn from our cover story
(page 56). But I won’t hold back on
my own secret: I can’t get enough of
well-told stories about unfathomable
evil like this.
I was rapt when my catechism class
turned to the first Biblical murder, of
Abel by Cain. In college, I devoted my
senior thesis to In Cold Blood, Truman
Capote’s attempt to make sense of
the random murder of the Clutter
family in their home on the Kan-
sas plains. Perhaps my favorite
film character is FBI trainee Cla-
rice Starling in The Silence
of the Lambs, the every-
woman who hunts for
one serial murderer with
clues offered by another.
I may be rationalizing,Bruce Kelley,
editor-in-chiefThe Evil Truth
but I believe I devour these kind of
stories for a legitimate reason: They
concern the search for the hardest
truths imaginable. What kept me lis-
tening to the Hodel story, for instance,
wasn’t just ghoulish fascination. It was
admiration. The voices of the family
members reckoning with the horrors
caused by their loved ones carried a
searing honesty that can’t be faked.
If you, too, are drawn to stories of
ordinary people experiencing the
worst their fellow humans have to of-
fer and somehow coming out stronger,
I do unhesitatingly recommend one
recent source. As I read the 41 tales
in our new True Crime collection, I
felt each bringing me closer not
only to crime fighters, survivors,
and witnesses, but to humanity.
The books are available at shop
.rd.com/truecrime. I think you’ll
find them thrilling reading.Write to me at
[email protected].Regular people caught
in frightening situations make
for page-turning journalism.