This riveting account will leave readers questioning every odd relative they’ve known.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Olsen presents the story chronologically and in a simple, straightforward style, which works well: it is chilling enough as is.” —Booklist
“An unsettling stunner about sibling love, courage, and resilience.” —People Magazine (book of the week)
“If You Tell accomplishes what it sets out to do. The result is a compelling portrait of terror and a powerfully honest, yet still sensitive, look at survival.” —Bookreporter
“This disturbing book recounts the unimaginable abuse and torture three sisters Nikki, Sami, and Tori Knotek endured from their own mother, Shelly…the strong bond they form to survive and defy their mother’s sadistic tendencies is inspiring.” —BuzzFeed
“A true-crime tour de force.” —Steve Jackson, New York Times bestselling author of No Stone Unturned
“Even the most devoted true-crime reader will be shocked by the maddening and mind-boggling acts of horror that Gregg Olsen chronicles in this book. Olsen has done it again, giving readers a glimpse into a murderous duo that’s so chilling, it will have your head spinning. I could not put this book down!” —Aphrodite Jones, New York Times bestselling author
“A suspenseful, horrific, and yet fascinating character study of an incredibly dysfunctional and dangerous family by Gregg Olsen, one of today’s true-crime masters.” —Caitlin Rother, New York Times bestselling author
“There’s only one writer who can tell such an intensely horrifying, psychotic tale of unspeakable abuse, grotesque torture, and horrendous serial murder with grace, sensitivity and class…A riveting, taut, real-life psychological suspense thrill ride…All at once compelling and original, Gregg Olsen’s If You Tell is an instant true-crime classic.” —M. William Phelps, New York Times bestselling author
“We all start life with immense promise, but in our first minute, we cannot know who’ll ultimately have the greatest impact on our lives, for better or worse. Here, Gregg Olsen—the heir apparent to legendary crime writers Jack Olsen and Ann Rule—explores the dark side of that question in his usual chilling, heartbreaking prose. Superb and creepy storytelling from a true-crime master.” —Ron Franscell, author of Alice & Gerald: A Homicidal Love Story
“A master of true crime returns with a vengeance. After a decade detour into novels, Gregg Olsen is back with a dark tale of nonfiction from the Pacific Northwest that will keep you awake long after the lights have gone out. The monster at the heart of If You Tell is not your typical boogeyman, not some wandering drifter or man in a van. No. In fact, they called her…mother. And yet this story is about hope and renewal in the face of evil and how three sisters can find the goodness in the world after surviving the worst it has to offer. Classic true crime in the tradition of In Cold Blood and The Stranger Beside Me.” —James Renner, author of True Crime Addict
“This nightmare walked on two legs and some of her victims called her mom. In If You Tell, Gregg Olsen documents the horrific mental and physical torture Shelly Knotek inflicted on everyone in her household. A powerful story of cruelty that will haunt you for a long time.” —Diane Fanning, author of Treason in the Secret City
“Bristling with tension, gripping from the first pages, Gregg Olsen’s masterful portrait of children caught in the web of a coldly calculating killer fascinates. A read so compelling it kept me up late into the night, If You Tell exposes incredible evil that lived quietly in small-town America. That the book is fact, not fiction, terrifies.” —Kathryn Casey, bestselling author of In Plain Sight
★ 10/21/2019
This horrifying tale of a dysfunctional and murderous family in rural Washington State from bestseller Olsen (A Killing in Amish Country) focuses on Shelly Knotek and how she abused, tormented, and controlled her third husband and her three daughters. Not for the squeamish, the narrative chronicles how the girls endured beatings, bleach baths, and verbal abuse, at the same time shedding light on how and why Shelly’s family bowed to her tyranny for years. Shelly brought others into her insane world and home, including her nephew Shane, her best friend Kathy Lorenzo, and an almost stranger Ron Woodworth, all of whom ended up dead. Eldest daughter Nikki, after years of torture, fled to her grandmother’s and began a new life, while middle child Sami bargained with Shelly that she wouldn’t tell the family secrets if she could go to college. But youngest sister Tori was left at home, and when Tori revealed that she was now the target of violence, the sisters banded together and forced a police inquest that resulted in the rescue of Tori and the arrest and imprisonment of both parents. This riveting account will leave readers questioning every odd relative they’ve known. Agent: Susan Raihofer, David Black Agency. (Dec.)Due to a production error, this review originally erroneously published as a non-starred review.
Karen Peakes narrates this true-crime story of Shelly Knotek, a woman who knew no bounds. Peakes’s performance sucks the listener into the scenes of abuse, torture, sadism, and, eventually, murder committed by Shelly. Her victims were her three daughters, Nikki, Sami, and Tori; her husband’s nephew, Shane; and her friends, Kathy and Ron. Peakes delivers the narrative in an appropriately unemotional tone as the horrendous actions are committed. The dialogue of the psychopathic, shrew-voiced Shelly is sharply contrasted with that of her soft-voiced, abused husband, Dave, and her brainwashed helper, Ron. Peakes shifts to lighter, younger-sounding vocalizations to differentiate the meek and degraded daughters. This true story, gleaned from the daughters and relatives, is disturbing. Peakes’s narration is compelling. M.B.K. 2021 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine
2019-09-24
A true story of three abused sisters who helped put their mother behind bars.
Nobody seemed to notice when a live-in babysitter vanished from the home of Dave and Shelly Knotek in tiny Raymond, Washington, in 1994. Then two more of the family's boarders disappeared, and Shelly's three daughters suspected the frightening truth: The couple had murdered the missing people. In his latest true-crime book, Olsen (Lying Next to Me, 2019, etc.) follows the half sisters, whose fears proved justified when—after the older two went to the police with the approval of the third—Shelly and Dave were arrested in 2003 and sent to prison for their roles in the deaths of babysitter Kathy Loreno and two others. It's a grim tale, told in 85 short, James Patterson-esque chapters, leavened only by the sisters' courage, strength, and love for one another. For years, Shelly inflicted sadistic abuses on her boarders and her daughters as Dave helped or stood by passively. Loreno was drugged, beaten, starved, and subjected to a crude form of waterboarding using a bucket and modified seesaw, and the Knoteks' other victims endured similar cruelties. Olsen had access to the sisters, Dave Knotek, and a grandmother. Yet his overheated and repetitive prose robs the victims' heart-rending stories of the high emotional impact they deserve. The three sisters are TV movie-ready tropes: Nikki, the strong-willed oldest; Sami, the accommodating middle child; and Tori, the baby who understood nothing until she understood everything. As for their mother, "Shelly was Cujo. Freddy Krueger. The freaky clown, Pennywise, from It." For all its sordid details, the book never satisfactorily answers a question at its heart: In the sort of small town in which everyone tends to know everyone else's business, how did the Knoteks' horrific crimes go undetected for so long?
Murder, torture, and sisterly love milked for all their potential melodrama.
