The Jack the Ripper murders of 1888 continue to exert a macabre hold on the imagination over a century later. Among the first serial murders, their brutality and bizarreness, and the seeming impossibility of detection have a terrible fascination.
What kind of person could have performed such horrific deeds, and could have overstepped the boundary of what marks humankind? How could they not have been caught by the huge police effort?
The Ripper murders had a huge impact. Though not the first serial murders they were the first to create a worldwide storm of media attention and the first in which the killer was given a nickname. The term Ripperology was coined for the study of the murders. Suspects have included the eminent Victorian doctor Sir William Gull, royal gynecologist Sir John Williams and the painter Walter Sickert. Conspiracy theories abound, involving Masonic, Jewish and other connections. Hundreds of books have been written about the murders, and several films made but the Rippers identity remains a mystery. But perhaps no longer.
Jack the Ripper: The Hand of a Woman is the result of extensive research by author John Morris and his late father. Starting with the many unresolved questions about the murders they concluded that they could be answered if Jack was in reality a woman. But who could she be?
The story of their researches includes many twists and turns as they reach an all too plausible conclusion, naming a suspect and answering the question of why the murders started, and just as suddenly stopped.
