Cries Unheard: Why Children Kill: The Story of Mary Bell

by Gitta Sereny

Book Overview

England's controversial #1 best-seller. What brings a child to kill another child? In 1968, at age eleven, Mary Bell was tried and convicted of murdering two small boys in Newcastle upon Tyne,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0805060685
• ISBN13: 9780805060683
• Release Date: April 2000
• Publisher: Owl Books (NY)
• Length: 382 Pages
• Weight: 0.88 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.5" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Good book...but

This is a very good and interesting book. However, I don't agree with Mary being able to get any money from her story and the fact that money was her primary motive for telling her story makes me question her motives and honesty. Also, it is apparent that Ms. Sereny had been a far from unbiased onlooker regarding Mary since she committed her crimes. Not sure I believe any of this, but still a good book. I hope Mary's rehabilitation is true; but considering the fact that she has done nothing but manipulate people her entire life, I'm not convinced.

A fascinating tale of a life after...

This book documents the transformation of Mary Bell from what was obviously a sociopath to a "Morally Aware" adult. What is even more interesting, it seems that Mary Bell made this transistion despite the best efforts of the Home Office.The seeds of the Mark Bell transformation seems to be the efforts of an gentleman *without* formal Corrections training. This gentleman was charged with her incarceration just after her conviction. Later Mary was transfered from his custody to an adult prison, where remarkably her "morality" suffered, but survived.It makes one wonder about the wisdom of the "Try as an adult" laws that are becoming popular in the United States.I would strongly recommend that the reader, read Ms. Serenys previous book on the Mary Bell Murders (if you can find it) *before* reading this book. Failing that, internet has several good sites on the Murder and Trial.

Fascinating!

Cries Unheard, subtitled Why Children Kill: The Story of Mary Bell, is one of the best books I have ever read. Don't expect that you will understand why children kill after reading this book. This is a compelling account of an eleven year old English girl in 1968 who murdered two boys. This is not in any way your usual "true crime" trash novel.I'm a true crime reader and find most of this genre to be a waste of time. This book is one to keep in your library with In Cold Blood and The Sea Will Tell.

Rehabilitation is the most humane goal of imprisonment.

This is an appalling story, not simply because of what Mary Bell did but because of the confusion of attitudes surrounding the issue of what an appropriate response to those actions might be. Children do not become as angry and as cruel as Mary Bell was without cause, and given the fact that they ARE children, and very much the product of their environments, she should be understood to be a victim of those circumstances as well as a victimizer. Children under the age of puberty quite clearly do not have an adult perception of consequences or an adult grasp of morality, nor for that matter the capacity for adult self-control. To treat them as adults, therefore, is simply to entrench in them the rage that led to the initial crime. If we subscribe to the view that imprisonment should be a rehabilitative process, then we cannot do anything other than applaud Mary's emergence into a relatively normal adult life outside prison: in particular, the very positive experience she had at Red Bank under the care of Mr Dixon - obviously one of those rare, humane and loving individuals the prison service is probably too short of - points the way to those who wish to reform the treatment of children in protective custody. To cast aside the life of an 11-year-old by blaming her for the sins which were committed against her and which her actions mirror back to society is obviously in itself another crime, and Gitta Sereny's book slowly and persuasively builds up the case for this view. By the way, since we as yet know next to nothing of the backgrounds of the children who killed in the USA recently, it is too early to say they too were not victims of a careless and uncaring adult world: their anger cannot have been causeless. Read this book with an open mind and then work for reform of the juvenile justice system!

Profound and important.

For starters, Sereny is an excellent writer. She takes the story of a child murdering a child and delicately peels away the layers of neglect that brought a young girl so far. We in the US have seen way too many young killers splash across the news. Here is at long last a book that shows us how these erruptons occur.This really ought to be a must read for any person involved in juvinile justice, education, theraphy, and any other discipline that places adults near troubled children. All of us can learn something here that will make us better family members, friends and relatives of children in crisis.

An interesting and thought provoking read

"Cries Unheard" is the most castigated book to be published in Britain in 1998. Why? It is the story of Mary Bell who at the age of 10 years murdered two little boys and was found guilty of the crime in an adult court of law. The book has been reviled in the British press because, 30 years after the killings, Gitta Sereny has interviewed Mary Bell herself to try to understand why these terrible events happened. The crux was that Gitta Sereny paid Mary Bell for her time and this has opened up a moral can of worms: should criminals be seen to benefit financially from their crimes?Controversy over this issue has blinded many in Britain to the merits of this book although Sereny explains in her work why she felt it appropriate to pay Ms Bell. I tend to agree with Sereny since there can be little point in investigating these sorts of crimes unless we can hear directly from the perpetrator as to why they acted the way they did. In order to prevent children killing children, surely we need to understand what it is that has driven these kids to kill? In nearly all cases, Sereny argues, the behaviour of these children can be traced to a trauma in childhood. Mary Bell herself had a damaged childhood and the killings of these boys were her cry for help. These cries were unheard since Mary was sent to an adult prison where she became institutionalised. It is only now that Mary has understood what she has done and her remorse would appear to be genuine. The book carefully records her life in excruiting detail and I would defy anyone not to be horrified by the various ordeals that she has suffered.The story of Mary Bell carries many lessons, particularly for those who deal with child criminals and children who are in care. But it also carries a wider message; in order to prevent these tragedies happening again, we need to be alert to the "cries". I should emphasise that in no way does the book attempt to justify what Mary Bell did. Both the author and Mary herself fully accept that she was guilty as charged and that there can be no reparations to the families who lost their children.I was profoundly taken with Ms Sereny's book. I was sad for the child victims and I was moved by Mary herself. If you are of an open mind, and you really want to understand why little children do such terrible things, you will want to read this book. I would particularly recommend it to anyone who is interested in child psychology or even in why people do what they do. Don't take the moral high ground: the lessons to be learned from the story of Mary Bell are far, far too important to be ignored.