The Attack of the Commas

They mean blood. Lots of it. They embed themselves like ink maggots twisting words, skewing thoughts, and threatening deletion. I know.  I’m a victim. It’s a serious assault. Everyone knows only amateurs abuse commas. Professionals like me, an author of twenty six books and hundreds of articles, are never victims of these dreaded creatures. Wrong! These miniscule terrorists creep into

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What’s Your Theory? Is It Time to Connect the Dots?

R ecently, a sophomore at the University of Virginia, Hannah Graham, was reported missing. She met her friends for dinner, stopped off at two different parties off campus and was seen leaving alone from the second party. She had texted her friends at 1:20 am to let them know she had been lost trying to get home. The police have

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What’s A “Good” Psychopath?

“P sychopath up.” says Dr. Kevin Dutton, a leading expert on functional psychopathy. “A bit of localized psychopathy is good for all of us.” Huh? Your first reaction might be that Dutton, a research psychologist from Oxford University, and author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths, might have had one too many servings of bangers and mash. Think again. Psychopathic traits fall

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Psychopaths Who DON’T Kill

A re there really psychopaths who don’t kill? Most psychopaths are not murderers. They’re all around us – often successful in careers from blue-collar to high level executives and professionals. Think of it as a Psychopathic Spectrum – a scale that measures the number of psychopathic traits in an individual. Like any scale, a person can have a few traits

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Who is Joshua Jenkins? An Author’s Tale.

M ost people have forgotten the teenager or never heard of him. I used to be one of them. It was a lovely day in Los Angeles. I had just flown in from New York to visit my friend, Fern. One of our favorite pastimes was to swap stories – everything from local people to major events.  Fern asked me

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Six Killer Psychopaths Explain Themselves

P sychopaths have no empathy – no conscience – they don’t care what people think or say about them. Their only concern is self-gratification. A psychopath will lie as easily as tell the truth since there’s no guilt, regret, or responsibility for their words. In general, their language is filled with self-references reflecting their ego-centric lives. It’s always about them. The

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A Thimbleful of Arsenic

I t was the 1870s and everyone was humming a popular song: Lydia Sherman is plagued with rats Lydia has no faith in cats. So Lydia buys some arsenic, And then her husband, he does die, And Lydia’s neighbors wonder why. Lydia moves, but still has rats; And still she puts no faith in cats; So again she buys some

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Can You Spot A Psychopath?

N ot all psychopaths are murderers and not all murderers are psychopaths. There are a lot of psychopaths out there who aren’t physically violent. There are also a lot of people who have some (but not all) psychopathic behaviors (see The Psychopathic Spectrum). Can you spot a psychopath? Read the questions below and choose the answer that you believe best

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What’s in a Last Meal?

W hat’s in a Last Meal? Why are we intrigued by death row last meals? A google search of “last meals on death row” produced over 3.5 million results. There are famous last meals, strange last meals, haunting last meals, and everything else. The concept captures the morbid imagination of everyone from movie producers to scientists . . . and us.

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The Scariest Shows

I ‘ve conducted countless interviews, seen hundreds of movies, TV shows, documentaries, and read books about psychopaths. There’s only one series that makes Criminal Minds look like family fun. When you watch, your blood turns to ice, you check your doors and windows, and go to bed with the light on. If the voice doesn’t invade your sleep, or the

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