Member Reviews

Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Firstly, thank you to Peter Thorley for writing this book, it cannot have been easy and must have brought back so many memories for him.
An interesting, yet subjective take of exactly what went on at 10 Rillington Place. As the brother and uncle of Beryl and Geraldine Evans, he had first-hand knowledge of the events that took place at the time. Christie was as we all know a monster, but there is not much known about Timothy Evans-so, at last, the story is told. he must have been a nightmare to live with., and then to live in the same house as Christie as well.-Horrid.

I am sure that Beryl would be very proud of her younger brother for putting the record straight.
R.Ip Beryl, Geraldine, Ethel Christie and all the victims of Christie, Evans and that terrible house.

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This is a really, really great account of the now infamous murders taken place at 10 Rillington place.
Honest, harrowing, detailed and emotive, it is written with first hand knowledge by the brother of one of Christie’s alleged victims.
A must read for true crime fans everywhere.
Easily worthy of 4 stars ⭐️

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I have watched a few TV series about this so this book was a must read. It is a very interesting read and extremely well written. This book is a must read for anyone who is interested in true crime. Thank you to NetGalley and Mirror Books for an advance copy.

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True crime writing at its best.A book a story that will shock.I had not hurt of this case but once I got into the horrific story that I could not stop reading.#netgalley #mirrorboks

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I quite enjoyed reading the author's take on the tragic events that ended his sister and his nieces lives. Out of curiosity after reading this I looked up the movie and was shocked at how differently the events were portrayed. While a hard topic for this author I can tell it is one dear to his heart. He presents a very solid argument about what he believes that his sister was not killed by John Christie, and I found myself believing him.

The story flows very well, although I did find myself flagging a little bit when his brother in law is lying to the police, creating big elaborate (but false) stories. I feel like that could have been condensed and honestly I didn't care about anything a notorious liar had to say. Maybe just include the points that were consistent with what only the killer would know.

Other than that a heartbreaking read about the killers among us that look and act like normal people, but carry dark secrets. Chilling.

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10 Rillington Place - the very name conjures up the horrors of decomposing dead bodies and the images of Christie looking like a mild-mannered bank manager. In the 1940s/1950s, John Reginald Halliday Christie strangled at least eight women including his wife, Ethel and hid their bodies at 10 Rillington Place where he lived. Christie was found guilty and hanged for his crimes but controversy still exists over whether he killed fellow lodgers Beryl Evans and her daughter Geraldine. Beryl's husband and father of Geraldine, Timothy Evans, was found guilty of his daughter's murder and hanged, but later reviews led to him being given a royal pardon and their murders attributed to Christie. Peter Mylton-Thorley, Beryl's youngest brother, had first-hand knowledge of both Evans and Christie, and believes that Evans was absolutely guilty of killing his own wife and child.

I read about this case years ago, and I distinctly remember the author of that book arguing that Evans had been an innocent party. It always sat a little uncomfortably with me as the murders of Beryl and Geraldine did not fit with Christie's other crimes. It was, therefore, interesting to read about both men from someone who knew them and I think that the author puts together a convincing case. It was written in a very accessible style without being sensationalist (although there is a photograph of Beryl from the morgue which is rather shocking). I recommend this for anyone who is interested in true crime books.

Thanks to NetGalley and publishers, Mirror Books, for the opportunity to read an ARC.

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I don't usually read true crime books. They have no appeal, but Rillington Place has a macabre iconic fascination.
Peter Thorley has more reason than most to tell the truth. For the last seventy years he has mourned the murders of his sister, Beryl, and niece, Geraldine at 10 Rillington Place.
This is an unique and very personal approach to the question of who killed them. Ludovic Kennedy's book, published sixty years ago, portrayed Timothy Evans as an innocent man. In 1966 he received a royal pardon and common myth has continued to name Christie as the killer.
Peter Thorley knows this is not true. His book is a monument to his sister and his niece and a very clear guilty verdict for Timothy Evans.

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What a fascinating read not only as another perspective on the crime that both Timothy Evans and Reginald Christie hung for, that of the murder of his sister Beryl Evans and her daughter, his niece Geraldine, but of the effect that murder has for ever more.

Peter Thorley was still in his teens when his sister and his niece were killed while living at 10 Rillington Place although he was on his way to a new life at the time the murders happened. But, his is the only first-hand account that we have of the victims and it sounds as if he spent a fair amount of time with the Christies while visiting his sister and of course he was only too aware of Timothy Evans's temper!

Typically any books about this crime concentrate on the miscarriage of justice that caused Timothy Evans to hang for the murder of his daughter and this book therefore gives another view as well as some social history relating to what life was like in the post-war years in England from one who was there!

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Most people who are interested in true crime will have heard of 10 Rillington Place but to read it from the perspective of a victims brother/uncle is more eye opening (in my opinion)
Peter tells of his sister and niece, how he used to visit them before being sent away to the other side of the world.
Having seen a tv drama of the ‘story’ I thought I knew everything there was to know about 10 Rillington Place but I was wrong. The fact there were 2 murderers under the same roof at the same time, the story is written by someone who had not only been in the house but had spent time in the company of both of them.
The pain is evident for Peter as he recalls his story and his time spent in the house.
He and his wife Lea have spent 35 years researching for the truth of the day he lost his sister and niece, I hope by correcting some media wrongs he has some peace now.

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If you think of the ‘House of Horrors', the term is now synonymous with the heinous decades' long crimes of Fred and Rose West. A collection of young women systematically abused, mutilated and murdered, then disposed of - all at one address. Not a haunted house, nor simply a den of iniquity, a true House of Horrors. These addresses slip into the UK true crime vernacular and become common parlance upon true-crime experts. We know all about 25 Cromwell Street, but what about 10 Rillington Place?.

Well, it's a true crime I am familiar with, a film I'm familiar with and various books having been written about Reginald John Christie, the back street ‘abortionist’ who murdered 8 women (at the very least). Some he buried in his garden, while others he stashed beneath his floorboard, or hid away in a secret alcove in his kitchen. A serial killer at a time of great depravity, just after a world war, and London post blitz was certainly a place of penniless poverty and crime being opportune and easy to commit. It’s a place where this book begins in the late 1940s of central London and it's a time that is often forgotten, Peter describes with great clarity, certainly setting the scene for the tragedy that's about to beset his family.

However, Beryl, although murdered at the address, wasn't murdered by serial killer John Christie, it was at the hands of her alcoholic, and violent husband, who had strangled his wife, also suffocated his 13-month-old baby daughter. Historically, as it was at the same address, some speculated that Timothy Evans (hanged for the crime in 1960) wasn't the innocent party. So much so that he was posthumously pardoned and his sentence was widely condemned as a miscarriage of justice or was it?

Being a first-hand account it and devoted to his elder sister, Peter gives a rather interesting impression of Christie, having visited the house on several occasions for tea and sticky buns, the memoir does little to dispel any of christie’s countless murders, but does paint him in a different light, slightly. Peter disagrees that Christie killed his sister and with Timothy Evans being described as a womanising simpleton, a serial pathological liar, with drunken tendencies, the book explains in great detail and, not a character assassination, but what I would semble to be the truth. It would be so easy to label christie as the murderer of Beryl Evans and her daughter, the hanging of Timothy Evans even helped abolish capital punishment, however, contrary to popular belief and the British judicial system, I think he most certainly killed his wife and daughter.

A house of horrors it may have been, but a miscarriage of justice, this was particular murder, was not. A must-read for any true crime fan.

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I've recently seen the TV adaptation of this story so when a book was coming out written by one of the victim's relatives, then this was really something I wanted to read.

The author is the brother of Ethel - the wife and victim of John Christie who murdered her, and several others at their home at 10 Rillington Place. What a book this was to read and imagine that someone so close to one of the victims had written it. It's such an emotional case even now, so I can't imagine what it would have been like to have been so close.

The poor man. It's amazing he's written such an honest account and written from the heart. A unique view on one of the most infamous cases around.

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During the 1940's and 50's, John Christie, an English serial killer from Halifax, murdered at least eight people - including his wife Ethel- by strangling them in his flat at 10, Rillington Place, Notting Hill, London. Two further bodies were found wrapped in a tablecloth in the washhouse. They were Beryl Evans and her baby daughter, Geraldine. This is a shocking true story.

Peter Thorley is the brother of Beryl Evans who was murdered along with her baby. Timothy Evans was convicted of the murder of his wife and child, he was hanged. People thought it was a miscarriage of justice that Timothy had been convicted. But now his brother-in-law, Peter Thorley has written this book and he believes that the verdict was justified. Peter tells us how Timothy was a drunk and violent towards his wife. This is an engrossing, fascinating, thought provoking and informative read. I highly recommend this book to all true crime fans.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Mirror Books and the author Peter Thorley for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

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As someone who watches and reads way more true crime than she perhaps should, this case is one that is relatively unheard of and relative to other murder cases this one has very much flown under the radar in both the UK, where the crimes took place, and the wider world; this may have a lot to do with the fact that the crimes actually occurred sixty years ago. During the 1940s and 1950s John Christie, an English serial killer and necrophile from Halifax, murdered at least eight people - including his wife, Ethel - by strangling them in his flat at 10 Rillington Place, Notting Hill, London. Two further bodies were found wrapped in a tablecloth in the washhouse behind 10 Rillington Place - those of Beryl Evans and her baby daughter Geraldine. They were his lodgers.

In 1939 Beryl Thorley, then 19, married Timothy Evans. Baby Geraldine followed quickly and, determined to stand on their own two feet, the couple rented a room from John Christie and his wife Ethel, at 10 Rillington Place, not knowing how fatal this would prove. Over the years this case has sparked huge controversy surrounding the question of who actually killed Beryl and Geraldine. Now, more than 50 years later, Peter Mylton-Thorley, Beryl's youngest brother, is ready to tell his story. With first-hand knowledge of the real horror of life inside 10 Rillington Place, it is time to set the record straight. Peter has collected unseen evidence, never released crime scene photos and statements to the police. This is the shocking true story of the crimes and horror of life with John Christie, Timothy Evans and 10 Rillington Place.

This is a long-awaited true-crime serial killer thriller that not only makes for compulsive reading but packs in a lot of action and takes you on an emotional roller coaster ride for the duration of the story too. You can feel the passion and heartfelt emotion oozing from Thorley’s words as he attempts to tell his murdered sisters story as best he can. It is well written, pacey and it develops an atmosphere of oppression and claustrophobia as life within 10 Rillington Place and its four walls is described. The life, brutal murder and subsequent investigation into Beryl’s slaying in 1940s London is harrowing, thought-provoking and deeply disturbing, to say the least. It is clear that this would've been a difficult book to write and at times it's also a difficult book to read; it's deeply personal and deals with a lot of trauma. I hope in some way the writing of it was cathartic and that it will help the author to heal. Many thanks to Mirror Books for an ARC.

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A very interesting read. Someone who was present gives a different perspective on what we all thought we knew.
For me there are still a lot of unanswered questions and the truth remains hidden.

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I love true crime stories.
This explained a lot of what happened and was so interesting
I like stories like this. Get to read crime facts and get to delve into true stories

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Inside 10 Rillington Place by Peter Thorley is the culmination of decades of research into the tragic events of 1949 when his sister Beryl and niece Geraldine were murdered. For those who haven't heard the story Beryl's husband . Timothy Evans was found guilty of murdering Geraldine and hung. Possibly the most important prosecution witness, was downstairs neighbour John Christie ,known to most at the time as "Reg" , . 3 years after Evans' hanging Christie left 10 Rillington Place and new tenants quickly found bodies hidden within his ground floor flat. More bodies were found in the garden and that of Christie's wife Ethel beneath the floorboards. At his trial Christie claimed to have killed Beryl Evans as well, something most saw as him clearing Tim Evans while Peter Thorley sees it as an attempt to avoid the noose by appearing to be insane.
Over the years various books and a famous movie pushed the case of Evans' supposed innocence and lead to campaign to clear his name.

The whole basis of Peter Thorley's excellent book is that Evans was very far from the innocent that campaigners and the media have portrayed and was in fact a violent fantasist who had threatened to kill more than on woman who had upset him,he also beat Beryl regularly and violently enough for neighbours to hear and express concern.
Peter Thorley knew the Christies very well ,during visits to his sister they'd often feed him and let him play with their Dog,obviously he also knew first hand the real Timothy Evans rather than the nice guy hard done by of later public opinion.

This is a very moving book,despite several decades having passed Peter Thorley still lays flowers at the joint grave of his sister and niece and has spent most of his life meticulously researching to ensure a first hand view of the personalities involved in events at 10 Rillington Place were made public..

One warning,there's a picture in the book of Beryl Evans on the mortuary slab that shows her naked and extremely battered body. I'm not squeamish and found it extremely disturbing, I know people who would have nightmares if the saw something like that.

An excellent,and very well-written, book that gives a different,and personal, insight into one of Britain's most famous legal controversies.

Thanks to Peter Thorley, Mirror Books and Netgalley for the ARC in return for an honest review.

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I wasn’t sure what to think of this for a while but I. The end I really enjoyed it. For me it was one that took a while to get into.

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Was there a miscarriage of justice, or did two killers live at the same address?

This account, written by the brother and uncle of two victims, casts doubt on the current belief, that an innocent man was executed. And, more importantly, this was one of the cases which led to the UK abolishing capital punishment!

Peter Thorley, whose sister was Beryl Evans, tells a heart-rending story about his beloved sister and her tragic circumstances. He knew all the people involved, spent time with the Christies and the Evans in 10 Rillington Place. And he has good arguments for his belief that Evans was guilty.

Definitely worth reading; even if it didn't change my opinion about the abolition of the death penalty.

Thank you to NetGalley and Mirror Books for an advance copy.

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This was an overall excellent book!! From reading early on you are able to tell that the author did some serious research into the history of 10 Rillington Place. For someone who has read hundreds of true crime books to give this particular one 5 STARS means that it truly stands out in the genre as a great book!

Thank you for the ARC of Inside 10 Rillington Place in exchange for a honest review.

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

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Written by somebody who was there before the murders took place, filled with more insight and information about the actual life of Timothy Evans and his wife Beryl. Not pleasant reading at times but has left me rethinking my idea of what happened at Rillington Place. The film had left me with a totally different idea of the man Christie and this book has made me think that the original trial of Timothy Evans wasn’t well carried out nor the free pardon given in the 1960s . I hope the book brings peace to Peter Thorley

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