Bott's Book of the Week: My Friend Dahmer...yeah...that Dahmer

So Jeffery Dahmer is a real American horror story. From 1978 to 1991, he was responsible for the murder of 17 men and boys in the great Milwaukee area. But it didn't end there, throughout the course of his trial it came to light that he consumed his victims.

Now...having said that...Why would anyone want to read a book about a serial killer/rapist? First of all, it's not necessarily a biography about Dahmer himself. It's more along the lines of how the author, Derf Backderf, shared a relatively normal high school friendship with this would be murderer. Backderf's art is straight up creepy; but it paints Dahmer in an almost sympathetic light. According to Backderf, Dahmer was a goofball. A kid who didn't fit in and someone who by all accounts was looking for guidance during an impressionable time in his life.

I hate that I felt sympathy for anyone who committed such heinous crimes, but that's what this book does. It makes the reader a.) Uncomfortable because we know the outcome b.) A little angry. I say that because, and Backderf says as much, "Where were the damn adults?" Now, Backderf's book is not without its flaws. He admits to being a bit of a bully and then contradicts himself as saying he was a friend. Still, the book is a quick and quirky read. Something that I don't want to visit again.