by John Glatt
First published 2016
In January 2015, Lacey Spears faced charges for murdering her five year old son Garnett with a depraved mind. Prosecutors claimed the 27 year old mother had fed him lethal amounts of salt through his feeding tube. Spears had crafted an image as a devoted parent, sharing constant updates about Garnett's severe health issues across social media platforms. Her Facebook posts and blogs painted her as a tireless caregiver managing her child's mysterious illnesses. The reality was far darker. Spears suffered from Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome and had systematically poisoned Garnett since infancy to gain attention from doctors and her online followers. A Westchester County jury convicted her in April 2015, resulting in a sentence of twenty years to life. Glatt draws from Spears's personal social media archives, an exclusive prison interview, and conversations with family members and the three detectives who solved the case to reconstruct this disturbing story of maternal manipulation and murder.
Genres: biography, crime, non-fiction, true-crime
Vibes: dark, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: deception, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Westchester County
Period: 2015
432 pages · Hardcover · St. Martin's Press
Content warnings: child-death, medical-trauma, murder