Don't be fooled by 5-star reviews | An Hour To Kill: A True Story of Love, Murder, and Justice in a Small...

Well written, but otherwise average. | An Hour To Kill: A True Story of Love, Murder, and Justice in a Small Southern Town (St. Martin's True Crime ... | Dale Hudson, Billy Hills

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	• An Hour To Kill: A True Story of Love, Murder, and Justice in a Small Southern Town (St. Martin's True Crime ... Dale Hudson, Billy Hills St. Martin's True Crime, 2001 - 272 pages average customer review:based on 124 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

True Till The End

Oh My Goodnes!!! I lived down in Conway SC. when this all happened and as I read the book I can remember this as if it was yesterday. He is very true and down to the point with every detail. To think that Mr. Registar offered all of his time and help to locate Crystal Faye Todd (even helped at the funeral, sat with her mother, etc.) and he knew the entire time where she was and what happen. I cannot even explain how real and true this book is. He is a great author and if you can ever get your hands on any of his other books I would recommend it.

Don't be fooled by 5-star reviews

I bought this book based on all of the five-star reviews and the abject raves from other readers, and am I ever disappointed. It's a run-of-the-mill murder "mystery" that is solved fairly quickly, with an uninteresting departure of focusing on the wrong guy. The "boy next door" stabbed to death 17-year-old Crystal Faye Todd in a monstrous frenzy. But nobody is prepared to believe when DNA points to teen who has given comfort and a shoulder to lean on to Crystal's mother. The murderer's parents believe the police have done a "frame job," and come across as almost comically ignorant. Get ready to read a lot of "it weren't a good thing." An Hour to Kill is a compelling read, but it cannot compare to classics in the "true crime" genre.

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Well written, but otherwise average.

An Hour To Kill is the story of a brutal murder in a small South Carolina town. As an avid reader of true crime, I have mixed feelings about the book. There are a number of negatives: The center picture section is weak. There is NO decent picture of the victim, Crystal Todd, merely a tiny blurred picture of her on her tombstone. As she was a high school senior, it should have been relatively easy to at least get a yearbook picture. Also, for no other possible reason than to fill up the section there are pictures of Mickey Spillane and his wife! These people really have nothing to do with the book, except as an afterthought, not even appearing in the book until the last few pages.
There is no depth given to the main characters, Ken Register and Crystal Todd. Due to a lack of information or interest, the authors present them as little more than props around which to base the story of the arrest and trial. This is especially poorly done with Crystal. She is the victim of a brutal murder and we learn virtually nothing about her except that her mother loved her.
There does not seem to have been much in depth research in the writing of this book, which would have helped as the crime is not in itself really that interesting or unusual, except for its sheer brutality,

This book could have been a total true crime trasher due to the serious faults listed above, but it is saved by the authors' narrative abilities.
The writing is crisp and clean. It is for the most part reportorial in nature, and avoids the trap fallen into by lesser true-crime writers, of feeling that they must express their own opinions of the crime. Consequently they do not impose their own personalities on the story, which in my opinion is almost always undesirable in a true crime book. The writers, Hudson and Hills, move the story along briskly and professionally. Ultimately, An Hour To Kill is an easy read, but could have been much deeper.

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Horrible Story - Not A Great Book

I purchased this book because of the strong reviews. Perhaps the other reviewers have not read a lot of true crime, because there was nothing special about this. Basically, it was a newspaper article extended with a few more facts to make a book. The story is horrifying, but you never really learn much about the people.

A vicious murder.

Churchgoer. Family friend. All-American boy. Murderer. Ken Register, much to the shock of the small town of Conway, South Carolina, was all of these things. Clean-cut, polite to a fault, and respectful of elders, Ken was the kind of guy parents wanted their daughters to date. But only months after a seventeen-year-old girl's brutal murder, the residents of Conway were in for another suprise: that the killer was one of their own.

A stunned community.

Crystal Todd and Ken were "best friends," and had even briefly dated. When Crystal's hideously gutted body was found near the woods of Conway, Ken checked in every day to console Crystal's mother and inquire about the murder investigation.

A shocking killer.

Ken was practically the last person anyone would suspect. Until he started acting nervous and suspicious, afraid he would be "framed" for Crystal's murder. And until DNA tests confirmed that he was indeed the man who repeatedly raped and stabbed Crystal Todd, then left her mutilated body in a ditch.

Discover, through fascinating first-person accounts, the tortured Southern son who committed murder; the courageous detective determined to break the case; the broken mother who lost her only child; and the disbelieving parents who, to this day, defend their son's innocence.

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