Notes on an execution A novel

Danya Kukafka

Large print - 2022

Ansel Packer is scheduled to die in twelve hours. He knows what he's done, and now awaits execution, the same chilling fate he forced on those girls, years ago. But Ansel doesn't want to die - he wants to be celebrated, understood. Through a kaleidoscope of women - a mother, a sister, a homicide detective - we learn the story of Ansel's life. As the clock ticks down, these three women sift through the choices that culminate in tragedy, exploring the rippling fissures that such destruction inevitably leaves in its wake.

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Subjects
Genres
Large type books
Psychological fiction
Thrillers (Fiction)
Novels
Published
New York, NY : Harper Large Print, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers [2022]
Language
English
Main Author
Danya Kukafka (author)
Edition
First Harper Large Print edition
Physical Description
465 pages (large print) ; 23 cm
ISBN
9780063211391
Contents unavailable.
Review by Booklist Review

Serial killer Ansel Packer is on death row. His path to execution is revealed in flashback through the eyes of Lavender, the mother who abandoned him; Saffron Singh, the detective who tracked him; and Hazel, the sister of his wife. Lavender clings to the belief that she rescued her sons by sending child services for Ansel and his baby brother after she fled their sadistic father. In contrast, Singh has been convinced of Packer's malevolence since they were kids and she discovered his collection of mutilated animals outside their foster home. Singh has been investigating the unsolved disappearances of three local women and knows that Packer killed them, just like he did those animals years ago, but she can't crack his respectable image. When Singh finally shatters Packer's facade, the three women are caught in the explosive fallout. Kukafka (author of young-adult thriller Girl in Snow, 2017) crafts a disturbingly remorseless killer in Packer but infuses the events that draw readers to his final moments with raw empathy and lingering questions about human evil and the the destruction left in its wake.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

This masterly thriller from Kukafka (Girl in Snow) opens on death row in a Texas prison, where Ansel Packer is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection in 12 hours. However, Packer, who's killed multiple women across the country, including in Texas and New York, isn't worried. That surprising attitude is accounted for by the early revelation that he befriended one of the prison guards and is plotting a last-minute escape. Flashbacks, starting with Packer's birth to a 17-year-old mother in 1973, trace his path from childhood to what seem to be his final hours. He grew up with an abusive father and began killing and mutilating animals when he was three. Those sections alternate with passages from the points of view of his mother, who was also abused, and of a New York State police investigator devoted to getting justice for Packer's victims. Kukafka skillfully uses the second-person present tense to heighten the drama, and toward the end she makes devastatingly clear the toll taken by Packer's killings. Megan Abbott fans will be pleased. Agent: Dana Murphy, Book Group. (Jan.)

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review

In Kukafka's unshakable, deeply compassionate second novel (following Girl in Snow), a Death Row inmate's final hours spark a meditation on murder and our society's morbid fascination with the violent men who commit them. Ansel Packer, inmate number 999631, killed three girls as a teenager, the justifications for which he has included in a grand Theory that will outlive him and assert his importance. But Ansel is not the only character in his story, and Kukafka smartly foregrounds her narrative on three women in his orbit: his mother Lavender, who fled the abuse of her husband by abandoning Ansel and his infant brother; Hazel, the twin sister of Ansel's ex-wife; and Saffron, a young homicide detective who once lived with Ansel in foster care. Their ordeals, which span more than four decades and intertwine in unexpected ways, show how acts of violence echo through the generations. Kukafka wrings tremendous suspense out of a story that isn't a whodunit or even strictly a why-dunit, suspense born out of a desire to see these women transcend the identities consigned to them. VERDICT A contemporary masterpiece that sits alongside The Executioner's Song and Victim: The Other Side of Murder in the library of crime literature.--Michael Pucci, South Orange P.L., NJ

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review

A murderer on death row awaits his execution. Ansel Packer has 12 hours to live. Emotionally detached from the deaths of Izzy Sanchez, Angela Meyer, and Lila Marony, the three girls he murdered almost 30 years ago, he's chiefly focused on the escape plan he's made with Shawna Billings, a prison guard, and his manifesto, in which he philosophizes about the nature of good and evil in the human psyche. While the clock ticks, Ansel is moved from Polunsky, his prison of the last seven years, to the Walls Unit, the last stop before his execution. Meanwhile, an earlier timeline presents the stories of Lavender, Ansel's lonely and abused mother, who abandoned him; Hazel, the twin sister of Ansel's former wife, Jenny Fisk, whom he may--or may not--have murdered; and Saffron Singh, a New York State police investigator, who has her own disturbing history with Ansel. Ansel is a chilling, creepy monster, tormented by memories of his mother and baby brother and hoping for sympathy that's never quite realized. The women's stories contain too much extraneous information and generally lack the emotional depth they need to compete with Ansel's fascinating creepiness. The backstory-heavy structure results in a slow pace whenever Ansel isn't present. His moment-of-death epiphany feels forced and is ultimately unconvincing. As a result, the promise of the intriguing premise in the early chapters isn't sustained. An epilogue that imagines the unlived lives of the murdered girls subtracts more than it adds. A slow-paced portrait of a condemned serial killer and the women who disappointed him. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.