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David Brown is never going to win any parenting awards. In fact if you look up world's worst father his picture would there amongst the crowd. This is the true crime case of a father that manipulated his fourteen-year-old daughter, Cinnamon, into murdering his wife. Cinnamon held this secret even after being sentenced to 24 years in prison. Her two lawyers know Cinnamon is protecting someone so they begin to dig further. They undercover a web of lies, betrayal, and a man that will use the women
*** some spoilers within ***This crime story is about the murder of a young mother in 1985 by her step-daughter who was then only 14 years old. She was sent to juvenile prison. The investigators at the crime scene felt that there was a wolf lurking in the background orchestrating these events. In this case it was David Arnold Brown, the husband of the murdered woman and the father of the young female murderer. The more the detectives probed, the more they found this family and household very dys...
I remember watching the Lifetime movie for this when I was a kid and becoming quite fascinated with Clancy Brown's voice. At the time I didn't realize that the movie was based on a true story. "If You Really Loved Me" by Ann Rule shows how David Brown was able to manipulate his 14 year old daughter (Cinnamon) and his wife's teenage sister (Patti) in a plot that would ultimately end in Linda Brown's death.I think what gets me most about true crime books is that you have to wonder sometimes how ca...
Ann Rule's "If You Really Loved Me" is the sad, sick, twisted story of David Brown, who loved power, prestige and money so much that he was willing to manipulate his teenage daughter into killing his young wife, in order that he might collect insurance money on his dead wife, buy a nicer, larger home and conveniently marry HER younger sister (his sister-in-law). David Brown has got to be one of the most despicable individuals Ms. Rule has ever written about - - not only did he instigate the murd...
David Brown is one of the most sadistic evil characters I have ever read about. As mentioned in the book he was worse than well known killers like Manson because he looked so normal yet wielded so much power. The story begins simply enough. Police are called to a house and discover a woman shot in her bedroom. Her name is Linda Brown, she is married to David Brown. They live with David's daughter Cinnamon, Linda's sister Patti, and their baby (Linda and David's) Krystal. David was out at the tim...
What a strange and while ride this was. I have very very vague memories of watching a lifetime movie about this case. I was familiar with the part where Cinnamon (honestly, who names their child Cinnamon??? Lol) was the one to kill Linda, Patti was brainwashed into believing she and David were in love, and David orchestrating the whole murder thing. I didn't realize just how much deeper this all went. Finally when David is arrested, and you think he can't get any worse, he does indeed get worse
I struggled to get through this book, not because the story wasn’t intriguing but because Ann Rule goes into far too much detail about matters that honestly don’t matter. I don’t need to know every tiny detail about every person that comes into play; the story of how a law enforcement agent met his wife is irrelevant to the story. Subjects that could have been covered in a page went on for chapters! The story is good but the story dragged on-I got to a point where I was thinking “just wrap it up...
David Brown loved child brides. All six of his marriages were to emotionally weak and uneducated females. Most of them were 15 years old when David began having sex with them. No one seemed to think that odd. David had married Brenda, his first wife, when both were 17. Both had dropped out of school a year before, and she was pregnant with Cinnamon when they married. Number three and five, Linda (they were married twice) was only 23 when Cinnamon was 14, but both girls liked each other. David wa...
Mini Review: An excellent true crime novel! I have read so many of Ann Rule's novels and they truly never get old. She is a wonderful writer and adds all the pertinent facts for readers to fully grasp the case at hand. This one is extremely intriguing. I watched the movie on Lifetime ages ago about this case and have been patiently waiting for time to read the actual book. Well, I wasn't disappointed! I highly recommend it.
This book was very hard to put down!!! It is hard to imagine that a man did this to his own family!!! This is a great read!!
David Brown, age 32, was a narcissistic sociopath who took out a huge amount of insurance on his 23-year-old third and fifth wife Linda, then convinced his impressionable 14-year-old daughter Cinnamon over a period of months that his wife wanted him dead and that Cinnamon must kill her stepmother to protect him. He enlisted Linda's 17-year-old sister Patti, who had been living with them since age 11, in the scheme. David had been molesting Patti since she moved in, and had groomed her and been s...
David Brown was the consummate entrepreneur: a computer wizard and millionaire by age thirty-two. When his beautiful young wife was shot to death as she slept, Brown's fourteen-year-old daughter, Cinnamon, confessed to killing her stepmother. The California courts sentenced her harshly: twenty-four years to life. But in the wake of Cinnamon's murder conviction, thanks in part to two determined lawmen, the twisted private world of David Brown himself unfolded with astonishing clarity -- revealing...
This is a terribly sad story of one man who was able to manipulate three vulnerable women. I read this book years ago and could only come away from it feeling terribly sad about the havoc Brown was able to create and his total lack of remorse for any of the women involved. While I hardly ever feel sympathy for people who take the life of other people, I find Cinnamon to be almost as much of a victim as her step-mother.Ann Rule was one of my automatic reads when I spent time reading this genre of...
I know I really liked reading this book.
I couldn't put it down. What a horrible, convoluted case .... a murder within a very peculiar family. A true case covered by the masterful Ann Rule, this one is many-faceted and provides a lot of food for thought. Really, I detested most of this family, with the exception of the troubled Cinnamon. Very well-rounded portrayal of defense and prosecutors. One investigator, even after making the arrest and getting a conviction, KNEW that something wasn't quite right about this case, and he pursued i...
This guy David Brown..was the ultimate in evil and a true sociopath. I have read so many books by Ann Rule but this is one of the most upsetting. What this one guy does to virtually every woman in his life is horrifying to read ab out. He was a master manipulator.Rule writes really well. Everything is well researched and she spears the reader nothing. The brutality of this book stayed with me and made me really hope nobody meets or has, a David Brown in their life. 3.5 stars.
Ann Rule was a badass. This story is bananapants but so well told. Absolutely loved how the prosecutor and investigator couldn't let things go until they got the truth. Incredible, and super sad, true crime story.