I started reading it and, for a while, couldn't put it down. I brought it into work and read it between phone calls. I will admit that I have a slight obsession with Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. It is by far my favorite movie. A complete masterpiece. I read what I can on it and this was a story that I didn't know. You don't know it either, which is reason enough to read this book.
Graysmith cleverly sets up chapters that bounce back and forth between Marli Renfo (Janet Leigh's nude body double) and Sonny (a killer, that we can only presume is Renfo's). He talks about Renfo on the set of Psycho, being sliced with the knife, only to then jump back to Sonny's story and compare him to Anthony Perkins's Norman. It's a smart way to capture an audience that would otherwise ignore this run of the mill true-crime novel.
After a huge set-up, and some fascinating scenes; after Marli's history with Playboy and nudie cuties, and repeating himself way too much, Graysmith finally delivers the twist. And then the book ends. No falling action, nothing. The twist. The end. I felt jilted, after all, it had been set up to be much more. Of course this Hitchcockian story would have a twist - but in all honesty - it would have been so much better as fiction. There were places I wanted this story to go, that it didn't because they just didn't happen. It could have been fascinating, but instead it fizzled out. Once we're off the set of Psycho, I stopped caring - but pushed through to see if the ending I imagined is the ending that occurred. It isn't.
Graysmith is caught between a nonfiction thriller and a biography of Renfo. The boring part of any biography, I think most will agree, is the garbage about where the subject is born and what life was like for their parents. I get it. Its shapes who they are, but this captures 0% of my interest, especially when you've disguised the book as a noir thriller.
He was smart to do one thing though, since he did feel the need to include it, at least he did it in the middle of the book. If he had jumped right out with her birth history I would have put this book down. I don't know who Marli Renfo is, and telling me where she's born does nothing to improve upon that. Smart to start with her naked in the shower. It's what the readers want, anyways.
Should you read it? It's an interesting enough story. Marli is a fascinating person, and despite Graysmith's tendency to repeat himself (a lot) there is some really interesting stuff (especially when it comes to Hitchcock's set).
Is it a story you could get somewhere else though? Better written and with the same good stuff? Probably. Do I regret reading it? No.
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