What I Read: Helter Skelter

My co-worker gave me Helter Skelter to read last week and I couldn't put it down. I’ve always loved reading about Charles Manson. I mean, who isn’t fascinated with Charlie? In a time of peace and love, when women were trying to fight for equality, Charles Manson was collecting women to come with him to the desert to serve him, feed him, sleep with him, even kill for him. 

I find Charles Manson’s philosophy fascinating. It is obvious that much of it is taken from The Bible and The Process, but the way he interprets the White Album is astonishing and creepy. I won’t be able to listen to that album again without thinking of Charles Manson.

His whole philosophy is very self-centered. From the start, Charlie’s beliefs (that he is Christ, that he is here to save the people, and that he will rule the future world) describe a man who is extremely self-centered. At the ranch, all the women are there to serve him. All they do is listen to him preach. He even thinks that the Beatles are singing to him. In court he has frequent outbursts and insists that he defend himself. All of these point to a man who thinks he is better than everyone. 

I can understand that sometimes people can be a bit crazy. But how do those people convince other fairly normal people to go along with their games? Most of the family was vulnerable to someone like Manson. Many of them were influenced heavily by drugs and many of them say that they were looking for something in their lives that was lacking. But who can say that killing people was the thing that was lacking?

What makes the book even more captivating is that Bugliosi is an amazing writer. It took me just over a week to read the 600+ page book – I couldn’t put it down. Most of the book is about the investigation and the trial, but the way he writes still makes it interesting. His narration of the trial process makes it easy for someone who isn’t familiar with law to understand. He is also extremely intelligent, often seeing connections where other people did not. The amount of research that went into both the trial and the writing of this book is apparent while reading. 

Bugliosi’s tremendous amount of research uncovers all the ways that the police department screwed up. There were so many clues that would have led them right to the killers that were ignored. Even though there were three murders with some variation of the word ”pig” written on the walls in the blood of the victims, the police thought that they were unrelated. It doesn’t seem like that would be very common, yet the police didn’t think there was any connection.I’m glad that I didn’t live in LA during that time because I would have had no faith in the police department. 

My favorite part of the book was the afterward. After being so gripped by the story and the book, I was dying to know what happened to all of the people involved. The book was originally written in 1977, and a lot has happened since then. Thankfully, the afterward (written in 1994) gave me a rundown of who was doing what from the Manson family. 

Helter Skelter was a really great read. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading about history, cults, crime, and Hollywood.