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A Father's Story
Product Group: Book
Publisher: William Morrow & Co (1994-03)
ISBN: 068812156X
EAN: 9780688121563
Dewey Decimal #: 364.1523092
Hardcover: 255 pages
Edition: 1st
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
The father of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer describes his shock at hearing the news of his son's crimes, his entry into a world of complete denial, and how, during Jeffrey's trial, he placed himself in his son's shoes. 150,000 first printing.
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Customer Reviews
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A Father's Story--by Lionel Dahmer
Rating  (5)
Date: 2008-06-25
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Having read this biography by Jeffrey Dahmer's father, I could not help but view it as a courageous book, and not motivated sheerly by profit-making. He had indeed been doing a lot of soul-searching before this book was written, during the investigation and trial, and I believe, probably since the entire story materialized and unfolded. He doesn't dwell on any of the unsavory details but must surely have been repulsed by them. Mr Dahmer's association to the killer and the reaction to him and his book can't have been one courted or desired, but neither is it something Lionel Dahmer appears to have run away from, but rather appears to have been thoroughly considered and faced in circumstances that would be extremely unwelcome and creating a deep sense of aversion in most normal human minds. While I could not wholeheartedly recommend this book simply on the basis for what it is and what it is about, it is unbelievable to me that Mr Lionel could actually find himself in such a position as someone's father with the recognition of his progeny had become such a bizarre,detestable and almost inhuman being..somehow. This question--'how'a person could in reality become such a being driven by such disgusting and perverse obsessions and desires, could never, and will never, be 'fully' answered. All one is left with are the 'facts', the details, of Jeffrey Dahmer.
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Terribly Sad,,,,
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-03-19
2 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
I cried when I read this book, I'm sad for Jeffrey and it would have made WAY MORE sense to have him studied in a hospital to find out if this could be prevented in the future. I did not cry for Jeff, I cried for his Father,,,,,I'm the parent of a son who was troubled in his youth and I could just feel his sadness and grief over his son and I wept for him and his wife and his mother and all of Jeff's victims.
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The Weight of Blame
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-01-12
4 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
On the heels of many a serial murder's crimes, we often find a different type of terrible person. There are often those who try to cash in on the deeds of something infamous, selling their tales to anyone that will listen, and there are those who try to make others forgive them and tell them they aren't to blame.
It is an ugly world when this happens and uglier still when these things first march into view.
When I first saw this book I thought it was the culmination of the two of these things, and I accordingly dismissed it for a time because the idea repulsed me and the few sensibilities I try to stay connected with. The thing that changed my mind on reading the book was an interview done with Lionel and his son a year or so before Jeffrey's death, when Jeffrey was setting with his dad and talking about many of the things that had transpired. Amongst many of the questions J.D. was asked, he was asked to tell his dad what he thought about what his father had written. This seemed to catch both of them off-guard a bit, but Dahmer finally responded by saying that the book captured things that even he had forgotten and that he thought the book was worth reading.
Considering how reviled Dahmer was by what he saw himself as, I wondered what that meant and wanted to look into the topic. And what I found was what the title entailed - it as a father trying to understand how his son had become something that he couldn't come close to comprehending.
Far from the read that True Crime readers might be looking for, this is the story of a father and the son he desperately tried to recall. It accordingly goes into the early aspects of the boy and delves into a few curious aspects that the father remembers, but it really spends a lot of its time trying to see where things "went wrong" instead of focusing on the gruesome details of what had transpired. That isn't to say there aren't references to the events that had transpired because there are, and that isn't to say that there aren't times when it seems like Lionel hopes he is blameless because all fathers would hope they were free of this guilt. The thing is that the point of the book is really to look at the exploration of a father wondering about the horrors his son was capable of and where that came from.
It did this by exploring everything, even looking into the idea of love and wondering how one could possibly ever atone for something so terrible as what his son had done. It also looked at where the father could have gone wrong, and the ideas were - painful.
I'm not going to go as far as some people and commend Lionel Dahmer for writing this book because I'm not sure anyone deserves a commendation for something like this. I will say that the book looked like a struggle, however, and that this struggle looked like one that seems almost unimaginable.
I would rarely recommend reading of this type but, in this case, the reviews are merited and then some. Knowing the topic tells you if you are interested in it and, if you are, then this is a prospective normally never acquired.
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Candid, introspective, one-of-a-kind
Rating (5)
Date: 2007-06-27
6 out of 6 customers found this reveiw helpful
Lionel Dahmer's memoir is the story of the dark journey of a father who was faced with the grisly reality of one of America's most notorious serial murder, mutilation, rape, necrophilia, and cannibalism cases. Lionel was a father who had to grapple not with losing his son to these unspeakable horrors, but with the fact that his son was the perpetrator. As a father, Lionel was asked if he could forgive his son, but before he could determine that, he had to forgive himself. The book presents Lionel's struggle with guilt, bewilderment, anger, and personal chaos during his son's life and in the aftermath of his arrest.
The memoir stands alone in its straightforward prose, introspection, and complete lack of blame shifting. Lionel provides broads stroke of details of the crimes, focusing more on the individuals than on the headline-grabbing depravity of Jeffrey Dahmer's deviance. Throughout Jeffrey's youth, and during the trial, Lionel grappled with his own responsibility for his son's social maladjustment. He identified with his son's need for control, extreme fear of abandonment, and general solitary nature. Lionel even contrasts Jeffrey's zombie experiments with his own hypnosis-control experiments in childhood. After Jeffrey's arrest, Lionel never wanted him to go free, but he did hope and work for psychiatric treatment for the son he was never able to save.
Lionel, I applaud you condor and introspection. You've written a book that will no doubt provide comfort to many parents of difficult children, and will help frame many of the "why?" questions felt by Americans with regards to your son's crimes.
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Dahmer's father able to provide truth or not?
Rating  (4)
Date: 2007-04-28
5 out of 7 customers found this reveiw helpful
I loved this book and I love to read and study about Dahmer. This is a great book but after seeing a documentary on tv about it, I am a little concerned about the authenticity of the information that his father is giving in this book. He makes a lot of claims about the state of Jeffrey's mother that she denies..... so that leaves me feeling ..hmmm??
I have to imagine as a father, this book would be very hard to write, talking about the heinous nature of his son's life before prison. What is his motivation for this? Due to some of his comments, I believe perhaps he is a little bit "off" himself too and able to detach himself and provide mostly truths.
On a personal note, I'm very disappointed that the prison left him in a situation where he ended up murdered. He could have and should have been studied. Not that the studies of Manson has answered all our questions, but when you get someone like Dahmer, it's got to be studied. He was willing to discuss his crimes and do all he could after his sick, twisted lifestyle came to an end.
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Amazon.com's Price:$39.49
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