The Writing Revolution

This article was an interesting read for me mainly because I was one of those kids who caught what was needed to be a decent write from the extensive reading I did growing up. It was decent, but still well below what it should have been. My twin on the other hand didn't enjoy reading and struggled with all the concepts of writing.  We were home schooled all up through high school by my mother.  The younger years we focused a lot on math and spelling, but sentence structure and writing was always pushed back and never given a priority.  The reason for this was the need for my mom to sit down with us and teach that topic.  This never happened very often because I have a special needs sister who is 3 years younger and during the time where we should have been getting the "formula" we were instead tagging along on hospital visits.  Once in high school we joined a charter school program that could be done at home with the guidance of teachers.  This guidance helped shape my writing and improved my brother's understanding of the basics.  I really liked  the quote "Give them a formula! Later, when they understand the rules of good writing, can figure out how to break them."  Once I was taught the "formula" I enjoyed learning to break the rules.

Researching Serial KIllers

Over the long weekend I started doing some unofficial researching, I guess you could call it, for my topic.  I've decided to go with my first choice of the psychological study of serial killers and how they have become such a popular theme in the US.  When I say "theme" I'm talking about the horror films, dramas on TV, and crime books that are so popular today.  Starting with getting names of some famous and well known killers was fairly easy.  There's Top 10 lists for everything on the internet now.  The website that I found had the most information on each of the subjects themselves at least in layman's terms, which right now is what I'm looking at, was about.com.  It seemed for the most part a reliable source of information and I was  curious to see if anyone else had ever used it before. 

I've narrowed my list to about 8 serial killers and will probably lower that number as the research continues. 
Charles Manson, Richard Ramirez, Coral Eugene Watts, The Zodiac Killer, Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, Jack the Ripper, and Ed Gein.  Another thought that hit me as I was copying these names down is that the names themselves are relatively unremarkable and most are common.  This is of course ignoring the Zodiac Killer and the Ripper part of Jack.  It is the acts of these individuals that make their names recognizable.  My curiosity is why is America so set on desensitizing individuals to these acts or is it their need to understand the acts themselves?  Why are they so popular? 

Anyway those were my thoughts off and on this weekend while I clicked through research and TV guide descriptions.