Headline, London, 1996, 1^st/1^st.  ISBN 0-7472-1760-2.  Hard cover, 370 pages including Chronology and Index.  Black boards with gold lettering on spine; light edge wear, upper corners and spine end bumped; outer page block lightly tanned, remainder dot on bottom edge; binding sound.  Dust jacket with price intact shows some edge wear, a few short edge tears some of which have been repaired on verso, light creases.  Book interior clean and unmarked; black & white photo plate sections.  Ding at top edge has resulted in three pages having shallow creases.  ‘There has never been a more relentless murderer in British penal history than the Gloucester builder Frederick West, who escaped justice by hanging himself in Winson Green Prison on 1 January 1995.  Charged at the time of his death with the murder of twelve young women – including his first wife and two of his own daughters – he was probably responsible for the deaths of many more in the course of his fifty-three years.  Despite the massive coverage given to the trial and conviction of Rosemary West, Frederick West himself remains an enigma, his life shrouded in mystery.  West, a nondescript little gnome of a man with a ready smile, demonstrated none of the characteristics usually associated with a serial killer.  Now, for the first time, the full story of Frederick West’s extraordinary life and death can be told, the secrets of his appalling crimes revealed.’ (from front flap)