In Cold Blood by Netta Newbound and Marcus Brown

In Cold Blood: Discovering Chris Watts: The Facts - Part One by Netta Newbound
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Time taken to read - in and out over a few days

Pages -

Publisher -

Source - Amazon Prime ebook

Blurb from Goodreads

We guess it’s safe to say most people will have heard of the Watts case.

Christopher Lee (Chris) Watts, the dashing, seemingly genteel, affable man who murdered his entire family in a calculated attack that shocked the entire world.

Shanann Watts, his pregnant, incredibly beautiful wife whose life was snuffed out because her doting husband decided he wanted a fresh start.

Bella Marie and Celeste Cathryn (CeCe) Watts, adorable sisters who worshipped their father, the very man who suffocated them both in cold blood using their comfort blankets against them. He then went on to dispose of their tiny bodies into huge tanks filled with toxic crude oil.

Nico Lee Watts, Chris and Shanann’s unborn son.

No doubt, most of you watched the story unfold on the news, open-mouthed, in total shock. What could push a loving father to brutally murder his family? Surely there was some mistake? We all have preconceived ideas of how a monster should look–grotesque, hideously deformed, a crazed madman–not this handsome, mild-mannered, shy, polite gent who was often portrayed as the perfect husband and father.

So, what happened?

During this series we will look at the facts, the police investigation, the evidence, hear Chris Watts’ explanation and his reasoning. We will try to make some sense of what occurred during the early hours of August 13th 2018.

We will endeavour to present to you all aspects of the case, right from the initial investigation and how it unfolded, to the first and subsequent confessions all transcribed word for word (where possible) from actual video and audio footage obtained from the FBI’s Discovery Files.



My review

So I haven't seen the FBI Discovery Files footage but I did watch the Netflix show on the Watts family and what Chris did. This book has the word for word transcriptions of the interviews with the police & Chris, Chris's secret girlfriend, the lie detector test and the conversation Chris has with his father when he confessed to killing Shanann.

They have transcribed the interviews pretty much verbatim, if there was ums and ams they are exactly as they were spoken. The book opens with a brief intro to the authors, then a look at definitions of sociopaths and the different kinds and which they feel is relevant to Chris. Then the rest of the book is all of the interviews. At the end of each there is maybe a paragraph or two from the authors with speculation on what has just been said.

It is interesting, as I said I hadn't seen the files, the authors stress if you have then the book is not for you. I assume because the majority of what you see if what they have scribed in the book, if you haven't seen the files and are drawn to true crime then you will be fascinated and shocked.

The text can be a bit heavy going and monotonous but it is exactly what was said, I would have expected much more input from the authors but there is really not much. It is largely the interviews which is shocking and we seen some from the Netflix but apparently it is much more in the files.

Now the title does say part one but I hadn't appreciated it would stop where it did, it ends abruptly just as Chris tells where he put the wee girls. Part two is £8.99 (at time of posting) and despite having seen the Netflix documentary and knowing exactly what happens I had to get part 2, I hate being left hanging. There is a third part but there isn't much to it, less than 100 pages I think but I will look at it properly when I finish book two, 3/5 for me this time.

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