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God’s Not Here, Only Devils: Revelations from the Toolbox Killers
The District Attorney began his opening statement with, "If you don't know what hell is like, you're about to find out."
In 1979, Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris went on a rape and killing rampage. The pliers, screwdrivers, hammers, sledgehammers, and ice picks they used on their victims became their calling card and moniker: The Toolbox Killers. They were soon apprehended and convicted for their atrocities, but for decades, refused to reveal the location of their victims' bodies. More than two decades later, criminologist Laura Brand had the opportunity to interview this sadistic pair as they sat behind bars, probing the depths of their depravity right up to the days of their deaths. Over this relentless six-year period, Bittaker finally gave Brand what he had withheld from law enforcement and families alike: the precise locations of two victims' remains. Brand's investigation tore open sealed police reports, court transcripts, and witness accounts, and unearthed brutal and shocking new findings: undisclosed victims, forgotten evidence, and chilling new insights that resurrected this nightmare in unimaginable ways.
God's Not Here, Only Devils is told through a powerful blend of narratives: the voices of Bittaker himself, his victims, traumatized witnesses, the tenacious lead detective, and the hardened District Attorney. This book pulls the reader into a visceral retelling of the horrors that unfolded and the legacy of terror the Toolbox Killers left behind.
In 1979, Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris went on a rape and killing rampage. The pliers, screwdrivers, hammers, sledgehammers, and ice picks they used on their victims became their calling card and moniker: The Toolbox Killers. They were soon apprehended and convicted for their atrocities, but for decades, refused to reveal the location of their victims' bodies. More than two decades later, criminologist Laura Brand had the opportunity to interview this sadistic pair as they sat behind bars, probing the depths of their depravity right up to the days of their deaths. Over this relentless six-year period, Bittaker finally gave Brand what he had withheld from law enforcement and families alike: the precise locations of two victims' remains. Brand's investigation tore open sealed police reports, court transcripts, and witness accounts, and unearthed brutal and shocking new findings: undisclosed victims, forgotten evidence, and chilling new insights that resurrected this nightmare in unimaginable ways.
God's Not Here, Only Devils is told through a powerful blend of narratives: the voices of Bittaker himself, his victims, traumatized witnesses, the tenacious lead detective, and the hardened District Attorney. This book pulls the reader into a visceral retelling of the horrors that unfolded and the legacy of terror the Toolbox Killers left behind.
- GenresTrue Crime
241 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 25, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 26, 2026
“Laura,” he said, my name falling from his lips like a last breath. “You tell him . . . everything. . . . Write it all for him,” his voice softer now, yet laced with a fierce urgency. “Write the whole thing. Everything. But write it solely for Romeo.”
- Lawrence Bittaker (urging the author to write this book for her unborn son)🤣🤣
This book is garbage. The only reason I completed it is because I don’t leave negative ratings or reviews on books I don’t complete. People need to be aware of this one. My best friend almost bought a copy. Luckily, I was far enough into it (a few pages) to steer him in the right direction.
I’m debating whether to shelve this under True Crime or create a new shelf entitled “Melodramatic, Mostly (if not fully)Fabricated Autobiographies”
There’s very little information available about Lawrence Bittaker, Roy Norris and their crimes. Now we have this book that’s supposedly devoted to the crimes, but has far less information than what can be found on Wikipedia. The majority of the book is the author’s incessant whining about her past relationship, and the author patting herself on the back for all of her accomplishments. The author doesn’t offer any specifics concerning her education or who pays for her research services. She comes off as more of serial killer groupie. In the photo insert there’s a picture of her and Bittaker. She’s wearing bleach blond hair, false eyelashes and a short skirt. That’ll earn a person respect in the serial killer community.
The banter between the inmates of California Men’s Colony Prison seems like it was lifted from an old gangster flick. I could almost hear them talking like cheap Humphrey Bogart impersonators. The supposed dialogue between the author and Lawrence Bittaker is as sappy as that from a dime store romance novel. At times the author and Bittaker pretend they’re characters from Alice In Wonderland during a conversation. They also pretend they’re Hannibal Lecter and Clarice Starling from Silence Of The Lambs. I wondered how Bittaker was familiar with the movie since he’d been on death row since 1979. That’s just one of the numerous inconsistencies.
The information about serial killers that was presented from the “author’s research” is interesting. I’m skeptical if she wrote the sections concerning the psychological aspects of serial killers and statistics. It seems like a completely different writer. My guess is that these sections were copied and pasted from other sources or textbooks.
Other reviews mention the book as being written using AI. I can’t attest to that, but there’s something definitely off about the book. It just seems fake.
Bittaker speaks with such eloquence. Practically every sentence out of his mouth contains a flourish of poetry. He’s portrayed as more of a hopeless romantic than a sadistic psychopath that’s spent the majority of his life on death row for raping, torturing and murdering teenage girls. The author even seeks relationship advice from Bittaker. Give me a break…
I’m left with one question. What is this book supposed to be? In a sense it’s factual. Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris existed. The victims mentioned in the book existed. Oddly enough, Bittaker and Norris were convicted of five murders, but only two victims are mentioned in the book. In a display of truly bad taste, the author also inserts herself into the story. Some chapters the author takes on the persona of the victims, the victim’s family members and even Lawrence Bittaker. The chapters are written in the first person. She thinks and speaks as if she were these people. Not only is it disrespectful to the victims, but it’s also confusing. The only way I could figure out who was speaking was to find a list of the Bittaker and Norris victims online.
Is the book supposed to be historical fiction? A few facts interspersed with the author’s imagination? This is the only thing that makes sense to me. It kind of works on that level.
Still, the writing is abysmal. If one more person clasped their hands together over their heart to signify love I think I might’ve puked.
On a lesser note, the author might want to make a little effort researching music if she writes a book in the future (which I won’t be reading.) Donna Summer didn’t record Ring My Bell and Bananarama wasn’t even in existence in 1979.
- Lawrence Bittaker (urging the author to write this book for her unborn son)🤣🤣
This book is garbage. The only reason I completed it is because I don’t leave negative ratings or reviews on books I don’t complete. People need to be aware of this one. My best friend almost bought a copy. Luckily, I was far enough into it (a few pages) to steer him in the right direction.
I’m debating whether to shelve this under True Crime or create a new shelf entitled “Melodramatic, Mostly (if not fully)Fabricated Autobiographies”
There’s very little information available about Lawrence Bittaker, Roy Norris and their crimes. Now we have this book that’s supposedly devoted to the crimes, but has far less information than what can be found on Wikipedia. The majority of the book is the author’s incessant whining about her past relationship, and the author patting herself on the back for all of her accomplishments. The author doesn’t offer any specifics concerning her education or who pays for her research services. She comes off as more of serial killer groupie. In the photo insert there’s a picture of her and Bittaker. She’s wearing bleach blond hair, false eyelashes and a short skirt. That’ll earn a person respect in the serial killer community.
The banter between the inmates of California Men’s Colony Prison seems like it was lifted from an old gangster flick. I could almost hear them talking like cheap Humphrey Bogart impersonators. The supposed dialogue between the author and Lawrence Bittaker is as sappy as that from a dime store romance novel. At times the author and Bittaker pretend they’re characters from Alice In Wonderland during a conversation. They also pretend they’re Hannibal Lecter and Clarice Starling from Silence Of The Lambs. I wondered how Bittaker was familiar with the movie since he’d been on death row since 1979. That’s just one of the numerous inconsistencies.
The information about serial killers that was presented from the “author’s research” is interesting. I’m skeptical if she wrote the sections concerning the psychological aspects of serial killers and statistics. It seems like a completely different writer. My guess is that these sections were copied and pasted from other sources or textbooks.
Other reviews mention the book as being written using AI. I can’t attest to that, but there’s something definitely off about the book. It just seems fake.
Bittaker speaks with such eloquence. Practically every sentence out of his mouth contains a flourish of poetry. He’s portrayed as more of a hopeless romantic than a sadistic psychopath that’s spent the majority of his life on death row for raping, torturing and murdering teenage girls. The author even seeks relationship advice from Bittaker. Give me a break…
I’m left with one question. What is this book supposed to be? In a sense it’s factual. Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris existed. The victims mentioned in the book existed. Oddly enough, Bittaker and Norris were convicted of five murders, but only two victims are mentioned in the book. In a display of truly bad taste, the author also inserts herself into the story. Some chapters the author takes on the persona of the victims, the victim’s family members and even Lawrence Bittaker. The chapters are written in the first person. She thinks and speaks as if she were these people. Not only is it disrespectful to the victims, but it’s also confusing. The only way I could figure out who was speaking was to find a list of the Bittaker and Norris victims online.
Is the book supposed to be historical fiction? A few facts interspersed with the author’s imagination? This is the only thing that makes sense to me. It kind of works on that level.
Still, the writing is abysmal. If one more person clasped their hands together over their heart to signify love I think I might’ve puked.
On a lesser note, the author might want to make a little effort researching music if she writes a book in the future (which I won’t be reading.) Donna Summer didn’t record Ring My Bell and Bananarama wasn’t even in existence in 1979.
September 1, 2026
I forced myself to finish this book to see if there was anything here that was revelatory or worthwhile. I first read about Bittaker and Norris’s crimes in a book called “Alone with the Devil” written by a forensic psychiatrist, way back in the early 90s. I’ve read a lot about various serial killers and you don’t find a whole lot about these two in part because their crimes were so brutal, and for another, they just aren’t that interesting. They were career criminals. They managed to stay out of prison for just 6 months before they were rearrested.
The only new information here (for me) was that Bittaker had a younger brother Charles. He was raised by his mother until he was three, at which point she relinquished custody of them to an aunt and uncle, and they were raised by them. (In the documentary there is also a revelation that his adoptive mother once had him lie on the bed naked and put cigarettes out on him as punishment for an arson he committed.)
Bittaker apparently had a soft spot for pregnant women without support. He tells the story in the book about how he offered to help a young pregnant woman who lived at the Scott Hotel when her family refused to help her. (However, in the documentary, which came out before the book this woman was interviewed to say that while he was initially nice to her, he eventually pulled a gun on her, and she jumped out of the van, and that ended their relationship.)
In this book, the author also becomes pregnant without support from the baby’s father, although she seems to have a supportive family. But I think she probably plays up this angle to gain sympathy from Bittaker.
I really thought this book was going to reveal some new factual information in a straightforward manner. It does not.
Flaws:
This book is poorly edited. There are many things that would be considered typos and several places where phrases are repeated in a sentence or in the next paragraph.
Missing words and capitalization, 235: Other hand gripping a boombox, The knack “My Sharona” so loud it rattled the seagulls.”
Same phrase repeated 3 different times, 195: “her figure outlined against the backdrop of the stained-glass windows.” Next sentence: sunlight catching the stained-glass windows behind her.” Next paragraph: “the sunlight gleamed through the stained-glass windows, casting a mosaic of colors” etc.
A really important point confused with a typo, 180: “He I was the one who raped her first.”
Page 107: Here she is recounting a conversation she allegedly had with her mother and grandmother after her best friend has been murdered by her cousin. (Note we get no details about what happened beyond her notification phone call and brief references later.) She has shown them a sympathy card signed by all the men on death row. She comments on how long it must have taken them on page 106. Her mother tells her how important her work is: “Yet, somehow you have pulled something human from each and every one of them. Something empathic.”
“They see something exceptional in you. These are serial killers from all over the nation, and the bottom line is that they believe in you, Laura.”
“They truly see you. They recognize that you are among the rare few who genuinely strive to help both victims and offenders. Just like Nicole and your cousin they perceived this long before tragedy struck. Don’t let them down…”
“They all need you, Laura; this is irrefutable proof of that. You are one of the only people in this world who can see past the horror and into the truth. It’s an exceedingly rare ability you hold,” her voice imbued with a mixture of reverence and urgency.”
I am highly skeptical that this conversation took place at all, mainly because it centers her and her “work” without expressing grave concerns for her mental health or her safety. It doesn’t read like a real conversation. It reads like the writer’s wish fulfillment fantasy. The chapter where she talks about her first exposure to serial killers when she saw Dahmer being discussed on the news also rings as false. Brand is an unreliable narrator at best.
You have metaphors like: “twirling my spaghetti over and over, my fork carving out endless spirals, as if I could disappear into them. The tornado of pasta mirrored the chaos in my mind—spinning, relentless, uncontrollable.” (103)
102 – she uses the phrase “nothing prepares you” five times in six sentences.
High egregious is her slipping into the first person to write the narrative from the perspective of the victim, or in one case the victim’s sister. These sections just pop up with no warning. Since we slip into Bittaker’s perspective at times – these sections presumably taken from letters he has written to the author—the reader doesn’t necessarily know who is talking. These sections are Hallmark channel treacle and inappropriate.
Norris pops up once briefly, as she receives phone call from him while she is with her mother about to go into church. Was she talking to him too? What did he tell her? Did it contradict what Bittaker said? In what ways? This is never addressed.
Bittaker’s IQ is mentioned multiple times, but I am not sure what that has to do with anything. He’s not an exceptional writer, based on the content of his letters she clearly put in her book. He was a petty criminal his whole life. He never managed to get away with anything for long. He chose a bozo for an accomplice who ratted him out the first change he got. He didn’t even manage to destroy all the evidence. He left the tape in the tape recorder that got him sent to death row.
The author’s credentials are hazy. She has a bachelor’s degree and apparently a PI license. This isn’t John Douglas or Robert Ressler with decades of formal law enforcement experience. She’s never worked in a correctional facility or in law enforcement. She reports that she is working on the “Dennis Rader BTK Task Force” without telling us what that means. Her greatest qualification seems to be that she can sit through hours of prison rape videos without getting up and leaving the room, so her professor tells her she was “built for it.” Everything about that seems highly suspect, but this woman is self-aggrandizing, so grain of salt whether this was actually said or not.
Her boldest claim is that Bittaker drew her a map where she could find both the evidence he buried along with one that showed the remains of the two victims whose bodies haven’t been located yet. A quick search reveals that Andrea Hall’s sister has a gofundme trying to raise $750,000 to locate her sister’s remains based on Brand’s info. So, the book ends with no conclusion about the biggest bombshell her work allegedly produced. Was there ever a search for the missing evidence? Did she try to coordinate a search for the bodies?
To me, it seems the only thing she ever organized was the sale of the rights to her story to get a documentary made and get a podcast up and running.
The “I’m just in this for the notoriety” details: --
-Bittaker wrote the foreword to her book.
-She calls herself the “Siren of San Quentin” on social media. I saw it was her handle on reddit as she was engaging in a serial killer forum.
-Pliers on the cover of the book over an image of a blonde woman
She never seems to have the appropriate level of suspicion about Bittaker that she should. That he is just using her because she is a young, attractive woman who wants to talk to him and will go to great lengths to show up and visit. There is one point where he asks if she is going to talk to Douglas Clark the next day instead of him, but then he feeds her information that guarantees that she’s going to spend the next day with him. I’m thinking, oh yeah, he’s clearly manipulating you. I can imagine what they are saying about you when you leave.
(Revised from original review.)
The only new information here (for me) was that Bittaker had a younger brother Charles. He was raised by his mother until he was three, at which point she relinquished custody of them to an aunt and uncle, and they were raised by them. (In the documentary there is also a revelation that his adoptive mother once had him lie on the bed naked and put cigarettes out on him as punishment for an arson he committed.)
Bittaker apparently had a soft spot for pregnant women without support. He tells the story in the book about how he offered to help a young pregnant woman who lived at the Scott Hotel when her family refused to help her. (However, in the documentary, which came out before the book this woman was interviewed to say that while he was initially nice to her, he eventually pulled a gun on her, and she jumped out of the van, and that ended their relationship.)
In this book, the author also becomes pregnant without support from the baby’s father, although she seems to have a supportive family. But I think she probably plays up this angle to gain sympathy from Bittaker.
I really thought this book was going to reveal some new factual information in a straightforward manner. It does not.
Flaws:
This book is poorly edited. There are many things that would be considered typos and several places where phrases are repeated in a sentence or in the next paragraph.
Missing words and capitalization, 235: Other hand gripping a boombox, The knack “My Sharona” so loud it rattled the seagulls.”
Same phrase repeated 3 different times, 195: “her figure outlined against the backdrop of the stained-glass windows.” Next sentence: sunlight catching the stained-glass windows behind her.” Next paragraph: “the sunlight gleamed through the stained-glass windows, casting a mosaic of colors” etc.
A really important point confused with a typo, 180: “He I was the one who raped her first.”
Page 107: Here she is recounting a conversation she allegedly had with her mother and grandmother after her best friend has been murdered by her cousin. (Note we get no details about what happened beyond her notification phone call and brief references later.) She has shown them a sympathy card signed by all the men on death row. She comments on how long it must have taken them on page 106. Her mother tells her how important her work is: “Yet, somehow you have pulled something human from each and every one of them. Something empathic.”
“They see something exceptional in you. These are serial killers from all over the nation, and the bottom line is that they believe in you, Laura.”
“They truly see you. They recognize that you are among the rare few who genuinely strive to help both victims and offenders. Just like Nicole and your cousin they perceived this long before tragedy struck. Don’t let them down…”
“They all need you, Laura; this is irrefutable proof of that. You are one of the only people in this world who can see past the horror and into the truth. It’s an exceedingly rare ability you hold,” her voice imbued with a mixture of reverence and urgency.”
I am highly skeptical that this conversation took place at all, mainly because it centers her and her “work” without expressing grave concerns for her mental health or her safety. It doesn’t read like a real conversation. It reads like the writer’s wish fulfillment fantasy. The chapter where she talks about her first exposure to serial killers when she saw Dahmer being discussed on the news also rings as false. Brand is an unreliable narrator at best.
You have metaphors like: “twirling my spaghetti over and over, my fork carving out endless spirals, as if I could disappear into them. The tornado of pasta mirrored the chaos in my mind—spinning, relentless, uncontrollable.” (103)
102 – she uses the phrase “nothing prepares you” five times in six sentences.
High egregious is her slipping into the first person to write the narrative from the perspective of the victim, or in one case the victim’s sister. These sections just pop up with no warning. Since we slip into Bittaker’s perspective at times – these sections presumably taken from letters he has written to the author—the reader doesn’t necessarily know who is talking. These sections are Hallmark channel treacle and inappropriate.
Norris pops up once briefly, as she receives phone call from him while she is with her mother about to go into church. Was she talking to him too? What did he tell her? Did it contradict what Bittaker said? In what ways? This is never addressed.
Bittaker’s IQ is mentioned multiple times, but I am not sure what that has to do with anything. He’s not an exceptional writer, based on the content of his letters she clearly put in her book. He was a petty criminal his whole life. He never managed to get away with anything for long. He chose a bozo for an accomplice who ratted him out the first change he got. He didn’t even manage to destroy all the evidence. He left the tape in the tape recorder that got him sent to death row.
The author’s credentials are hazy. She has a bachelor’s degree and apparently a PI license. This isn’t John Douglas or Robert Ressler with decades of formal law enforcement experience. She’s never worked in a correctional facility or in law enforcement. She reports that she is working on the “Dennis Rader BTK Task Force” without telling us what that means. Her greatest qualification seems to be that she can sit through hours of prison rape videos without getting up and leaving the room, so her professor tells her she was “built for it.” Everything about that seems highly suspect, but this woman is self-aggrandizing, so grain of salt whether this was actually said or not.
Her boldest claim is that Bittaker drew her a map where she could find both the evidence he buried along with one that showed the remains of the two victims whose bodies haven’t been located yet. A quick search reveals that Andrea Hall’s sister has a gofundme trying to raise $750,000 to locate her sister’s remains based on Brand’s info. So, the book ends with no conclusion about the biggest bombshell her work allegedly produced. Was there ever a search for the missing evidence? Did she try to coordinate a search for the bodies?
To me, it seems the only thing she ever organized was the sale of the rights to her story to get a documentary made and get a podcast up and running.
The “I’m just in this for the notoriety” details: --
-Bittaker wrote the foreword to her book.
-She calls herself the “Siren of San Quentin” on social media. I saw it was her handle on reddit as she was engaging in a serial killer forum.
-Pliers on the cover of the book over an image of a blonde woman
She never seems to have the appropriate level of suspicion about Bittaker that she should. That he is just using her because she is a young, attractive woman who wants to talk to him and will go to great lengths to show up and visit. There is one point where he asks if she is going to talk to Douglas Clark the next day instead of him, but then he feeds her information that guarantees that she’s going to spend the next day with him. I’m thinking, oh yeah, he’s clearly manipulating you. I can imagine what they are saying about you when you leave.
(Revised from original review.)
April 18, 2026
I can't believe I actually finished ahead of time and proceeded to forget to publish my review. That's a first! So sorry.
Well, it's been a while but I do remember this: I was not expecting this to be written almost like a novel. It feels less factual and more fictionalised. I wish we had more insight into the actual men and their crimes and less about the author.
I don't know, it was interesting to read these multiple POVs but it leaves the question of how real it actually is...does that make sense? How could the author know every little detail of what was happening in the minds of those women before they were killed? She couldn't, not really.
Not really sure how I feel about this book and the way it's written, honestly.
(Free ARC from NetGalley and Bloomsbury Academic that I chose to review after reading - Cross-posted on Goodreads & Pagebound on July 31st, 2026)
Well, it's been a while but I do remember this: I was not expecting this to be written almost like a novel. It feels less factual and more fictionalised. I wish we had more insight into the actual men and their crimes and less about the author.
I don't know, it was interesting to read these multiple POVs but it leaves the question of how real it actually is...does that make sense? How could the author know every little detail of what was happening in the minds of those women before they were killed? She couldn't, not really.
Not really sure how I feel about this book and the way it's written, honestly.
(Free ARC from NetGalley and Bloomsbury Academic that I chose to review after reading - Cross-posted on Goodreads & Pagebound on July 31st, 2026)
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
A searing account of grizzly murders and the inner workings of a killer’s mind forms the basis for this true account the 1979 Tool Box Killers.
Lawrence Bittaker along with his partner, Roy Norris, tortured, raped and murdered five teenage girls between the ages of 13 and 18. They met in California Men’s Colony in San Obispo and began to plan their crimes. What began according to Bittaker as “bullshit” talk slowly morphed into reality upon release. A phenomenon known as “Folie á faux” came from 19th C French psychologist Charles Lasegue and Jules Falret to describe a rare psychological condition in which two people share delusional beliefs or fantasies. But more than that there is a dominant who imposes the delusions on the submissive partner. Once however the delusion is shared it cements the serial killer partnership. In addition these killers have distinct traits like antisocial or sadistic personality disorders.
The book goes on to break apart the personalities of serial killers. Exploring other psychological aspects of human nature, the author exposes patterns and aspects of human psychology that possibly predispose certain individuals to serial homicide. Additionally serial killers are able to appears “appropriate” in social settings because in certain settings they can show empathy such as with family members. I found the chapters that explored these elements extremely interesting and helpful in understanding this kind of human.
The book also breaks down the cunning aspects of planning the murder - insane men acting sanely - and the mechanical and emotionless explanations of the events in the van (where the torture - using tools - and murders occurred) - described as if explaining dissembling a car engine. These are particularly scary moments in the book because they are said as if this is”normal.”
Interspersed in the book is the author’s story of what lead her to become a criminologist. I’m not sure how much this added to the book but given Brand got a sadist to share his crimes (they forged a connection where he named her are executor of his will), I’m giving that a pass. Plus as I write this I think Ed her story relieved some of the darkness of this story.
My thanks to NetGalley and Bloomsbury Academic for granting me access to this ARC.
Lawrence Bittaker along with his partner, Roy Norris, tortured, raped and murdered five teenage girls between the ages of 13 and 18. They met in California Men’s Colony in San Obispo and began to plan their crimes. What began according to Bittaker as “bullshit” talk slowly morphed into reality upon release. A phenomenon known as “Folie á faux” came from 19th C French psychologist Charles Lasegue and Jules Falret to describe a rare psychological condition in which two people share delusional beliefs or fantasies. But more than that there is a dominant who imposes the delusions on the submissive partner. Once however the delusion is shared it cements the serial killer partnership. In addition these killers have distinct traits like antisocial or sadistic personality disorders.
The book goes on to break apart the personalities of serial killers. Exploring other psychological aspects of human nature, the author exposes patterns and aspects of human psychology that possibly predispose certain individuals to serial homicide. Additionally serial killers are able to appears “appropriate” in social settings because in certain settings they can show empathy such as with family members. I found the chapters that explored these elements extremely interesting and helpful in understanding this kind of human.
The book also breaks down the cunning aspects of planning the murder - insane men acting sanely - and the mechanical and emotionless explanations of the events in the van (where the torture - using tools - and murders occurred) - described as if explaining dissembling a car engine. These are particularly scary moments in the book because they are said as if this is”normal.”
Interspersed in the book is the author’s story of what lead her to become a criminologist. I’m not sure how much this added to the book but given Brand got a sadist to share his crimes (they forged a connection where he named her are executor of his will), I’m giving that a pass. Plus as I write this I think Ed her story relieved some of the darkness of this story.
My thanks to NetGalley and Bloomsbury Academic for granting me access to this ARC.
April 2, 2026
ARC Read: NetGallery & Bloomsbury Academic
Pub Date: June 25th
God’s Not Here, Only Devils is a nonfiction ARC I received about The Toolbox Killers.
It wasn’t quite what I expected. Instead of diving deeply into Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris killing sprees in their van. The book focuses more on criminologist Laura Brand and her earlier life, being very descriptive with wording and adding fun facts about serial killers ect.
Pub Date: June 25th
God’s Not Here, Only Devils is a nonfiction ARC I received about The Toolbox Killers.
It wasn’t quite what I expected. Instead of diving deeply into Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris killing sprees in their van. The book focuses more on criminologist Laura Brand and her earlier life, being very descriptive with wording and adding fun facts about serial killers ect.
June 29, 2026
Poorly written and unsympathetic to victims.
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