The Magazine

Murder, They Wrote

The art of literary mayhem.

Nov 24, 2008, Vol. 14, No. 10 • By JON L. BREEN
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The final essay, by Dominick Dunne, concerns Lyle and Erik Menendez, the privileged Beverly Hills brothers convicted of the 1989 murder of their parents. Though it has a fascinating story to tell, it is one of the weakest pieces in the book, with a name-dropping celebrity/tabloid sensibility, irrelevant lifestyles-of-the-rich-and-famous details, meandering organization, and cliché-ridden prose full of vague attributions of the "some said" variety.

It's tempting to wonder if Schechter chose it to make a cautionary point about the state of contemporary true crime writing.

Jon L. Breen is the author, most recently, of Eye of God.

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