The dark double life of Ellen Boehm, the mother who murdered her two sons—and nearly killed her daughter.
Ellen Boehm, a single mom from St. Louis, Missouri, appeared devoted to her children. But in reality, she was unequipped for motherhood, financially strapped, and desperate. Within a year of each other, her sons, ages two and four, died mysteriously, and Boehm’s eight-year-old daughter then suffered a near-fatal mishap when a hair dryer fell into the girl’s bath. While neighbors wondered how Boehm remained so calm through it all, Det. Sgt. Joseph Burgoon of St. Louis Homicide had darker suspicions.
Burgoon soon unraveled a labyrinth of deception, greed, and obsession that revealed a cold-blooded killer whose get-rich-quick scheme came at the cost of her children’s lives. Boehm had taken out insurance policies on her children with six different companies totaling nearly $100,000. Using police reports, case documents, and photos, journalist John Coston recreates the events that led to one mother’s unspeakable acts of filicide—and a cop’s relentless pursuit of the truth.
This was an interesting true crime novel about how far a desperate woman would go to get a little extra money. At least that’s what I hope was the primary motivation.
Ellen Boehm is an overworked single mother of three children who has found herself at the end of her rope. She has definitely gotten the short end of the stick in terms of what life has thrown at her. This does not in any way excuse her behavior and the subsequent murder of her 2 young boys and the attempted (?) murder of her daughter.
The story was well written and gave the facts without straying too far into the emotions of the reader/author. The tale is heartbreaking, no doubt about it, and the author did a good job in presenting the case.
My issues with the novel stem, I think, from listening to the audiobook rather than reading a physical novel. The interviews were choppy and difficult to listen to and some of the timeline seemed a bit mixed up at times.
The author also changed the way of referring to the characters at strange times. For example Ellen’s daughter Stacy is referred to as “Stacy” and also as “Stacy Ann” with no rhyme or reason to it.
My last issue with the novel is the amount of repetition in it. We seemed to go over the same points over and over and over. I promise, I did not forget what we were just told last chapter, you don’t need to rehash everything again.
Overall, this was a fascinating true crime novel and a well written account. I enjoyed listening to this book on Audible, despite the confusing repetition involved. Again, maybe this would have been better had I read a physical copy rather than listened to the audio.
John Coston is a veteran journalist and a former news editor on the national desk at the Wall Street Journal. He has written for the Watertown Daily Times, the Hartford Courant, and the Miami Herald.
Coston is the author of two true crime books, To Kill and Kill Again (review) and Sleep, My Child, Forever.
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