In His Sights: A True Story of Love and Obsession
by Kate Brennan
Published by Harper
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Reviewed by Maria Elmvang
Usually I sit right down to write the review after I’ve finished a book. I couldn’t do that with In His Sights. The emotion of it was too raw and the implications too dire. I had to allow the book to ‘sink in’ somewhat, before putting my thoughts down on paper.
The book is subtitled “A True Story of Love and Obsession” and that line alone describes the entire book. Kate was a completely ordinary person until she started dating Paul, the millionaire. In the bright lights of hindsight, the warning bells should have started ringing almost from day one, but Kate grew up with an alcoholic and abusive father, and was therefore more willing to forgive and look past things that others would perhaps have balked at.
However, eventually it became too much, even for her, and she decided to leave Paul. But Paul wouldn’t allow that–in the past, it had always been he who’d left his girlfriends, and not the other way around, and that was the way it ought to stay. So in an attempt to rewrite history, he started stalking her. At first just by himself, but as time went by, he used his vast fortune to hire others to do his dirty work for him. Kate contacted the appropriate authorities, but nothing she did got him to stop for more than a couple of months at a time.
At the end of the book, Kate is still ‘on the run’–moving every couple of months, to get away from his harassment.
I was appalled to read how some people brushed Kate’s experiences off with a “He must love you very much.” No wonder so few stalkers are actually convicted. This isn’t about love; it’s about control.
In His Sights is a no-nonsense and un-sensationalized account of one person’s experience with a dedicated stalker, and as such should be required reading–for women to hopefully learn to see the warning signs early enough and take appropriate action; for men to know how to react if somebody they know are pursued by a stalker.
Armchair Interviews agrees.