Cruel Sacrifice
by Aphrodite Jones
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Book Summary Information
Author: Aphrodite JonesEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2005-05-03
ISBN: 0786010630
Number of pages: 333
Publisher: Pinnacle
Book Reviews of Cruel Sacrifice
Book Review: Five Sacrifices
Summary: 5 Stars
In a book about true crime, the worst kind: murder, where all of the main characters are under the age of 17, it makes you wonder exactly where this world is headed in the days so different from which our ancestors, and possibly even our parents, knew. Aphrodite Jones, a best-selling author, tries her best to take you foward in a world where things are too cruel for anyone to comprehend or even understand. This tabloid-like detailed book on how so-called friendships came to be, how and why the murder happened, and what happened to the girls once they were caught is a great read and is hard to put away unless you've turned every single page.
A small Indiana town was shaken and stirred when four young girls, Melinda Loveless, Mary (known as "Laurie") Tackett, Hope Rippey and Toni Lawrence took the life of an innocent 12-year-old Shanda Sharer all in the name of some sort of "puppy love." Sharer, who had only been a resident of her new town for less than six months, never had a clue that she was the target of death when she began her new life at her new school. Three of the murderers whom she did not even know or had ever seen before until the day she was taken from this world. Sharer had taken up a friendship with a young girl named Amanda Heavrin, Loveless's girlfriend at the time, and Loveless grew very jealous and hateful towards Sharer. Loveless feared that the two had more than just a friendship, which they eventually did. Loveless made a vow to have Sharer killed if Sharer didn't leave Heavrin alone, and in the end Sharer paid the ultimate price: her very young life.
With actual letters written between Sharer, Heavrin and Loveless, Aphrodite Jones takes you into the minds of the murderers & the innocent, and even their pasts, to try to and understand and break into little pieces what could spark something so evil, something so worse than just being young and "out of touch."
Typed exactly as written, two of the many letters from Heavrin to Sharer read this:
Shanda,
Hey honey. Yes, I do love you but I just feel like Melinda has me in a trance and I don't know how to get out of it and I'm scared. If I try to get out something bad will happen and I'm scared to death.
Love,
Amanda
Shanda,
I don't think I would ever tell Melinda that we're going out. She would probably kill you. Yes, I love you a lot, Shanda my honey.
Love ya,
Amanda
Reading about Loveless's past could either give you reason for her actions or spawn off lame excuses, but either way it makes an interesting twist for the case. Tackett's past does the same. Both girls are the "main characters" when it comes to Sharer's death. Hope Rippey and Toni Lawrence seemed to just be along for the ride, often making you wonder whether or not they wanted to be there when the murder took place, or if they realized that this was the real deal and wanted to make excuses to escape punishment. Lawrence often recalls wanting to save Sharer from death after Sharer pleaded to her just hours before her life was taken, but she feared Loveless and did nothing. Later Lawrence would explain this to Sharer's mother, but was denied any pity from the Sharer family.
The photographs of all five girls, including photos of Sharer's autopsy, are haunting and real and definitely add more to the story's text. Mug shots, where two of the murderers are smiling once they were caught, really make this book cold and heartbreaking.
In the end, five people lost their lives, whether taken away from the world or taken away from their families. Every "character" in this book paid a price. A sacrifice.
Summary of Cruel Sacrifice
On a freezing January in 1992, five teenage girls crowded into a car. By the end of the night, only four of them were alive. The fifth had been tortured and mutilated nearly beyond recognition. Her name was Shanda Sharer; her age - twelve. When the people of Madison, Indiana heard that a brutal murder had been committed in their midst, they were stunned. Then the story became even more bizarre. The four accused murderers were all girls under the age of eighteen: Melinda Loveless, Laurie Tackett, Hope Rippey, and Toni Lawrence. Here, for the first time, veteran true crime journalist Aphrodite Jones reveals the shocking truth behind the most savage crime in Indiana history - a tragic story of twisted love and insane jealousy, lesbianism, brutal child abuse, and sadistic ritual killing in small-town America...and of the young innocent who paid the ultimate price.The words of a murderer: "This should not have happened. This is not me. It's so stupid when you think about it. It shouldn't have caused a death. I don't blame me. We just need a little growing up. We were young, and we still are." Aphrodite Jones takes the reader into the world of several teenage girls in small-town southern Indiana--their clothes, rock music, and fascination with offbeat spirituality, and also their lesbian jealousies and penchant for violence. This book provides a useful balance to an earlier account by Michael Quinlan (Little Lost Angel). Jones's style is less dramatic than Quinlan's, but she devotes more space to the family backgrounds and psychological complexities of the two girls whose hot-vs-cold temperaments meshed to bring about the murder of 12-year-old Shanda Sharer.
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