My sweet angel: the true story of Lacey Spears, the seemingly perfect mother who murdered her son in cold blood

 

Title of the book: My Sweet Angel; The True Story of Lacey Spears, the Seemingly Perfect Mother Who Murdered Her Son in Cold Blood

Author: John Glatt

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Publishing Date: 2016

ISBN: 978-1-250-07113-2

Summary:

Lacey Spears made international headlines in January 2015 when she was charged with the “depraved mind” murder of her five-year-old son, Garnett. Prosecutors alleged that the 27-year-old mother had poisoned him with high concentrations of salt through his stomach tube.

To the outside world, Spears had seemed like the perfect mother, regularly posting dramatic updates on her son’s harrowing medical problems, but in reality, she was a text book case of Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome. From the time he was an infant, she deliberately made Garnett sick to elicit sympathy from medical professionals, as well as her hundreds of followers on Facebook and other social media. When a Westchester County jury found her guilty of killing Garnett in April 2015, she was sentenced to twenty years to life in prison.

Using Spears's own never-before-seen Facebook, Twitter, and blog posts, an exclusive prison interview with Spears herself, as well as interviews with her family and the three police investigators who broke the case, My Sweet Angel provides the definitive account of this shocking case. 

Author Info:
(From goodreads)

English-born John Glatt is the author of Golden Boy Lost and Found, Secrets in the Cellar, Playing with Fire, and many other bestselling books of true crime. He has more than 30 years of experience as an investigative journalist in England and America. Glatt left school at 16 and worked a variety of jobs—including tea boy and messenger—before joining a small weekly newspaper. He freelanced at several English newspapers, then in 1981 moved to New York, where he joined the staff for News Limited and freelanced for publications including Newsweek and the New York Post. His first book, a biography of Bill Graham, was published in 1981, and he published For I Have Sinned, his first book of true crime, in 1998. He has appeared on television and radio programs all over the world, including ABC- 20/20Dateline NBC, Fox News, Current Affair, BBC World, and A&E Biography. He and his wife Gail divide their time between New York City, the Catskill Mountains and London.

Personal Opinion:

I have a fascination with true crime, and unfortunately Lacey Spears case is also fascinating for me. As a mother of a five year old boy son, it truly breaks my heart that Laceys son went through so much unnecessary pain and of how he had fallen through cracks and couldnt be rescued from mommy dearest. In truth my issue with the book is that it feels as if there was very little new information about the case, which I was hoping for when I picked it up. Yes there is some new information, but intimate details about Lacey and her son as well as her family are lacking. Also, most of the book is about investigation and uncovering Laceys deeds as well as about the trial that happened after Garnetts murder. Truly a sad and headshaking case, but the book adds very little information. 

3 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)