Women Who Kill

By Ann Jones

Book Overview

This landmark study offers a rogues' gallery of women--from the Colonial Era to the 20th century--who answered abuse and oppression with murder: "A classic" (Gloria Steinem).

Women rarely resort to murder. But when they do, they are likely to kill their intimates: husbands, lovers, or children. In Women Who Kill, journalist Ann Jones explores these homicidal patters and what they reflect about women and our culture. She considers notorious cases such as axe-murderer Lizzie Borden, acquitted of killing her parents; Belle Gunness, the Indiana housewife turned serial killer; Ruth Snyder, the "adulteress" electrocuted for murdering her husband; and Jean Harris, convicted of shooting her lover, the famous "Scarsdale Diet doctor."

Looking beyond sensationalized figures, Jones uncovers different trends of female criminality through American history--trends that reveal the evolving forms of oppression and abuse in our culture. From the prevalence of infanticide in colonial days to the poisoning of husbands in the nineteenth century and the battered wives who fight back today, Jones recounts the tales of dozens of women whose stories, and reasons, would otherwise be lost to history.

First published in 1980, Women Who Kill is a "provocative book" that "reminds us again that women are entitled to their rage." This 30th anniversary edition from Feminist Press includes a new introduction by the author (New York Times Book Review).

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1558616071
• ISBN13: 9781558616073
• Release Date: October 2009
• Publisher: Feminist Press
• Length: 464 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.0" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

An intriguing look in what can drive women to extremes

What drives women to a violent extreme? "Women Who Kill" is a discussion of women who have taken on the role of murderer. Drawing a discussion where some women feel driven to kill out of fear of their lovers, Ann Jones believes that it should not be surprising when women lash out, but it should instead be surprising that it doesn't happen more often. Discussing battered woman's syndrome and its place in court cases, "Women Who Kill" is an intriguing look in what can drive women to extremes.

A fascinating contrast with the usual alarmist fare about women

Usually, when people write about the crimes that women commit, it's a complicated dance of omission and deception. A recent article in Newsweek magazine illustrated this approach: arrests of violent girls were up 125%, it said. The article never gave the raw number for arrests, however, nor did it define the circumstanes of those arrests, or place them in context. Most critically, it did not place those arrests up against the figures for male violence. Women commit approximately ten to fifteen percent of all violent crimes, yet in fact they are subject to an almost all-male law enforcement and judicial system which is inhabited by conservative males who judge them harshly. Jones explores the context for these judgements, and points out that women are routinely judged twice: as criminals, and then as that mythical creature, Woman, who's sugar and spice if s he knows what's good for her. Thus, while men kill their children to get revenge on escaped spouses, women tend to kill in self defense or because of mental illness. The merciless response to Andrea Yates---rendered psychotic by too much childbearing, too much stress, and the indifference of her breeder-mad fundie hubbbie, is prefigured in this book by the case of the Irish epilectic maid who killed her mistress clumsily while in the midst of an attack and received no mercy whatsoever. Similarly, in the chapter dealing with despoiled maidens, the author makes the critical point that by letting some women get away with murdering men who had 'seduced' and abandoned them, society was upholding the status quo. Women did not have the vote and yet were punished by the very people who held them powerless and wanted to keep them that way. By letting a few appropriately remorseful women off the hook, society could solve one woman's problem and ignore all the rest. Jones analyzes society's views of women and crime and weaves the analysis through a fascinating string of historical cases. Amongst the startling facts she reveals are that infanticide cases have remained more or less constant, as a percentage, since the 1700s, when draconian laws essentially removed women's right agaisnt self incrimination. If a woman bore a bastard child, she could be fined and whipped. However, if she was an indentured servant and bore a bastard child, her owner could recieve another SEVEN years of servitude from her and sell the child as well. So many employers profited by raping and impregnating their female servants that the law was changed, but nothing really stopped men from raping women. With heavy penalties for bearing bastards, women resorted to concealing pregnancies, delivering in secret, and then killing the babies. Then a law was passed, making it a capital crime to conceal the birth of such a child. She was dmaned if she did, and damned if she didn't---and it didn't matter if she was a rape victim or not. In some cases, girls were so ignorant of the facts of reproduction that they were effectiv

Women Who Kill

This book is a fascinating study of female killers. While the author makes several empirically false statements about female crime (for example, "women get heavier sentences than men", p. 9) she does provide us with an entertaining selection of crime and punishment involving women murderers. From brutal serial killers like Belle Gunness, whose crimes "speak powerfully to the vengeful, man-hating part of every woman" (p.138) to the stories of battered women who kill, Jones offers up a feast of delciously detailed murder in all its glory. Jones illustrates how race and class as well as gender affect how we view crime. This book shows how society's view of women has affected both the prosecution and sentencing of women who kill.