2 January: The Yorkshire Ripper

On 2 January 1981, Peter Sutcliffe, the "Yorkshire Ripper", was arrested. Here are ten things you might not know about him.

1. How many people did he kill? He was convicted of killing 13, but nobody knows for sure. His victims could number as many as 23, all women. He always denied that he'd ever killed a man.
2. In his youth, Peter Sutcliffe used to work as a gravedigger. Not only that, but he'd steal any objects of value he found on the corpses, and would later claim that it was the voice of God coming from a grave that told him to kill prostitutes.
3. Other jobs he had included working on a packaging line and as an HGV driver.
4. For his first attempt at murder in 1969, his weapon of choice was a Sock filled with stones. Luckily for the woman concerned, the toe of the sock split and all the stones fell out. Sutcliffe legged it to his friend's car and told him to drive away, pronto. After that, it was only a matter of time before Sutcliffe decided a hammer was much more effective.
5. That same friend, by 1980, suspected Sutcliffe was the Ripper. He wrote a note to the police and later visited the police station in person, to tell them what he knew - but none of his tips were follwed up
6. The first woman he killed was Wilma McCann in October 1975, although there had been a couple more violent assaults before that.
7. The Yorkshire Ripper had a wife, Sonia (nee Szurma) who remained married to him until 1994, when they were divorced.
8. While the police were on the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, they received a taped message of a man with a Wearside accent saying, "I'm Jack. I see you're having no luck catching me." On the basis of that, they narrowed their search but it turned out to be a hoax. The hoaxer, John Humble, got an eight year prison sentence for attempting to pervert the course of justice.
9. He committed his final murder on 17 November 1980, a woman named Jacqueline Hill.
10. A few weeks later, another prostitute had a lucky escape when she was spotted in a car with Peter Sutcliffe by a police officer who recognised the woman as a prostitute he'd encountered before. Then the officer noticed the car had false number plates and so he arrested Sutcliffe for that, not realising who this was. Sutcliffe told the officer he desperately needed to pee, and was allowed to go behind a storage tank. When police noticed that the perp brought in for false number plates resembled descriptions of the Ripper, they went back to the scene of the arrest and found that when Sutcliffe had been allowed to go and relieve himself, he'd dumped a hammer and a knife behind the tank. Two days later, Sutcliffe confessed.

Golden Thread

Terry Kennedy is inexplicably and inexorably drawn to the small town of Fiveswood as a place to live and work after university. He is sure he has never visited the town before, but when he arrives there, it seems oddly familiar.

Fiveswood has a rich and intriguing history. Local legends speak of giants, angels, wolves, a local Robin Hood, but most of all, a knight in golden armour. Fiveswood's history also has a dark side - mysterious deaths blamed on the plague, a ghostly black panther, and a landslide which buried the smugglers' caves.

Terry buys an apartment in The Heights, a house which has been empty for decades, since the previous owner disappeared. Now he has finally been declared dead, developers have moved in and turned it into six flats. Terry has the odd feeling he has lived in this enigmatic house before. But that is not all. Since childhood, Terry has had recurring, disturbing dreams which have been increasing in frequency so that now, he has them almost every night. To his dismay, the people from his nightmares are his new neighbours.

Except, that is, for Eleanor Millbrook. She is refreshingly unfamiliar. After Terry saves her from a mysterious attacker, they become close. However, Terry's nightmares encroach more and more on his waking life, until they lead him to a devastating discovery about who he really is.

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Goodreads Review for Golden Thread:

This is a standalone book rather than one of the "super" series. Excellent characterization, a "keeps you guessing" plot, and some fairly deep philosophical issues ! Would recommend this to anyone, but especially recommended if you would like to see a completely new "take" on the people with powers / alternate futures / general oddness type story lines. Somebody make the film !