When She Was Bad

Winner of the Arthur Ellis Award for Best Non-Fiction Crime Book

From award-winning author and journalist Patricia Pearson, When She Was Bad questions our understanding of violent women.

Why do some women murder their children? Why do others team up with men in ghoulish killing sprees? What motivates the female serial killer?
     When She Was Bad explores the enigmatic heart of female darkness, drawing into focus such fascinating characters as Dorothea Puente, who murdered several elderly tenants in her boarding house in Sacramento; Mary Beth Tinning, who killed eight of her children in upstate New York; Karla Homolka, who joined forces with Paul Bernardo to abduct, rape and murder school girls in southern Ontario; and Karla Faye Tucker, the born-again Christian who was executed in Texas for having killed two people with a pickax.
     In this provocative book, Patricia Pearson explores women's innate capacity for aggression, an idea we remain deeply uncomfortable with.