When Evil Came to Good Hart - Softcover

Link, Mardi

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0472033158 ISBN 13: 9780472033157

Publisher: UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN REGIONAL, 2008

Synopsis

"The murder mystery that has confounded and fascinated people for over forty years has been given a whole new life. When Evil Came to Good Hart is a well-researched and well-written piece of nonfiction that holds the reader in its spell, just as it has the many writers, reporters, and law officers who have puzzled over it. My highest praise for Mardi Link's book is to say that it reads like a good novel, a real page-turner."
—Judith Guest, author of Ordinary People and The Tarnished Eye

In this page-turning true-life whodunit, author Mardi Link details all the evidence to date. She crafts her book around police and court documents and historical and present-day statements and interviews, in addition to exploring the impact of the case on the community of Good Hart and the stigma that surrounds the popular summer getaway. Adding to both the sense of tragic history and the suspense, Link laces her tale with fascinating bits of local and Indian lore, while dozens of colorful characters enter and leave the story, spicing the narrative.

During the years of investigation of the murders, officials considered hundreds of tips and leads as well as dozens of sources, among them former secretaries who worked for murder victim Dick Robison; Robison's business associates; John Norman Collins, perpetrator of the "Co-Ed Murders" that took place in Washtenaw County between 1967 and 1969; and an inmate in federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas, who said he knew who killed the Robison family.

Despite the exhaustive investigative efforts of numerous individuals, decades later the case lies tantalizingly out of reach. It is still an unsolved cold case, yielding, in Link's words, forty years worth of "dead-end leads, anonymous tips, a few hard facts, and countless cockamamie theories."

About this title

From the Publisher

"Link paints Good Hart, then and now, as a land of fairy tales: "dark woods, warm cabins with smoke curling from their chimneys, worn footpaths down ancient routes, watery blue-grey horizons, a church, a graveyard, a a little store." Hidden among the fairy tale outline, Link details a suspicious cast of characters. The list of tips and suspects detectives followed included everything from, "Medicine doctors, strange Greek-god sounding names, a queen, and a pool-shooting bomb maker." -Northern Express

"When Evil Came to Good Hart author Mardi Link carefully pieces together the fragments and presents a sensible account of Michigan's most infamous cold case. Good reading." -Petoskey News-Review

"Speaking of scary, the Robison family was killed in cold blood over forty years ago in Michigan at their cabin and it remains a mystery to this day as to why they were murdered. Mardi Link's when Evil Came to Good Hart is the first detailed non-fiction exploration of these unsolved murders . . . this book should be a true crime staple for years to come." -Partners Book Distribution

From the Back Cover

When Evil Came to Good Hart is a new look into an old story, the cold-case file of the murders of a wealthy Detroit-area family in their northern Michigan cabin in 1968.

In this page-turning true-life whodunit, author Mardi Link details all the evidence to date. She crafts her book around police and court documents and historical and present-day statements and interviews, in addition to exploring the impact of the case on the community of Good Hart and the stigma that surrounds the popular summer getaway. Adding to both the sense of tragic history and the suspense, Link laces her tale with fascinating bits of local and Indian lore, while dozens of colorful characters enter and leave the story, spicing the narrative.

During the years of investigation of the murders, officials considered hundreds of tips and leads as well as dozens of sources, among them former secretaries who worked for murder victim Dick Robison; Robison's business associates; John Norman Collins, perpetrator of the "Co-Ed Murders" that took place in Washtenaw County between 1967 and 1969; and an inmate in federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas, who said he knew who killed the Robison family.

Despite the exhaustive investigative efforts of numerous individuals, decades later the case lies tantalizingly out of reach. It is still an unsolved cold case, yielding, in Link's words, forty years worth of "dead-end leads, anonymous tips, a few hard facts, and countless cockamamie theories."

Edition details

• Publisher: UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN REGIONAL
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0472033158
• ISBN 13: 9780472033157
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 200