The Prodigal Husband: The Tragedy of Helmuth and Hanna Buxbaum

by Michael Harris

Book by Harris, Michael

448 pages, Hardcover

First published November 5, 1994

About the author

One of Canada’s top investigative writers, Michael Terry Harris was winner of the 1995 Arthur Ellis Award for best true crime book for The Prodigal Husband: The Tragedy of Helmuth and Hannah Buxbaum. Formerly the publisher of the Sunday Express in St. John’s and later the Executive Director of News and Current Affairs for the Newfoundland Broadcasting Corporation, Harris has also been Queen’s Park correspondent for the National Post, and a national affairs columnist for the Sun News Service. Today, he host’s his own radio program, “Michael Harris Live,” on CFRA in Ottawa.

Harris’s previous books consist of the award-winners Justice Denied: The Law versus Donald Marshall (1986), Unholy Orders: Tragedy at Mount Cashel (1990), Rare Ambition: The Crosbies of Newfoundland (1992), The Prodigal Husband (1994). The Judas Kiss: The Undercover Life of Patrick Kelly (1995), was made into a television movie starring Paul Gross, and Lament for an Ocean: The Collapse of the Atlantic Cod Fishery (1998) was a national bestseller. To date, his work has sparked four royal commissions of inquiry.

Reviews

[Scott Harris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This Arthur Ellis Award winning account of the bizarre saga of Helmuth and Hanna Buxbaum was a fascinating read. Despite what looked like it was going to be a rather long book, the pages seemed to turn themselves as Harris walked his readers through the strange personality of Helmuth and the impact that it had on his family. This is far more complex than a simple story of a man hiring someone to kill his wife, it is the sex, drugs, religion, money, brain disorders, legal legends and murder.