The Spider and the Fly: A Reporter, a Serial Killer, and the Meaning of Murder

“Extraordinarily suspenseful and truly gut-wrenching, The Spider and the Fly is not just a superb true-crime story but an insightful investigation of the nature of evil, the fragility of good, and the crooked road that can turn human beings into monsters. A must-read.” -- GILLIAN FLYNN, author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Gone Girl “Part psychological thriller and part gut-wrenching memoir, The Spider and the Fly crosses boundaries on nearly every page. It is chilling, self-revelatory, and unforgettable.” -- ROBERT KOLKER, author of the New York Times bestseller Lost Girls: An Unsolved American Mystery “Claudia Rowe catalogues her obsession with a serial killer so mesmerizingly that before I knew it, I too was obsessed...But this is not merely a recounting of a descent, it is equally a memoir of discovery through the lens of potential evil. I literally could not put it down.” -- Alan Cumming, author of the New York Times bestseller Not My Father's Son “Rowe’s engaging prose means the pages practically turn themselves.” -- Kirkus Reviews “Readers seeking a literary look at the psychology of a criminal will find much to hold them rapt.” -- Booklist Poughkeepsie, New York, 1998 Eight women had gone missing over the past two years, but few were looking for them. Other than ragged flyers taped to downtown telephone poles, there was barely a sign they were ever here. Most were women who had walked the streets, sold themselves for drugs. But they were also daughters, sisters, and in many cases, mothers. In death, as in life, it was easier for this small upstate city to ignore them. The police had leads, including many about Kendall Francois, a large, awkward African American man repeatedly reported for attacking women whom he paid for sex. But Francois fit few of the familiar serial killer stereotypes, and detectives had largely written him off. One evening, seeming almost bored with the topic, Francois asked to speak with a prosecutor. Then, in a monotone voice just above a whisper, he shook the region to its core by pointing to mug shots of numerous women and announcing that he had killed them all. The bodies, he explained, were at home—in the house he shared with his mother, father, and teenage sister. Claudia Rowe, a young reporter living in Poughkeepsie, had heard chatter about the missing women. She mentioned it to her editors in New York City, despite the fact that the local paper acted as if the women didn’t warrant much ink. A serial killer couldn’t be on the loose in Poughkeepsie. It wasn’t that kind of place. But after Kendall Francois confessed, the entire town became consumed with a desire to understand how a man who’d grown up there, whom many had known, could have committed such brazen crimes. Even more perplexing, how could a family live seemingly unaware of rotting corpses in their home? Rowe wanted to understand those things, too, with a desperation that eventually stunned her. Over five years and through a series of letters, phone calls, and visits that consumed her life, Rowe engaged with a killer in a dizzying conversation about cruelty, compassion, and control, digging down to the roots of her own need to understand evil. Because the case never went to trial, many of the details she uncovered about Francois, his past, and his victims have never before come to light. A search for the origins of the darkest parts of human nature, a sticky narrative that skips back and forth through time, a beautifully written tale of a reporter’s relationship with her subject, a coming-of-age story that forces a deep reckoning with ourselves, a sociological dissection of class, race, and crime in an upstate New York town, The Spider and the Fly is a multifaceted reading experience that will chill you to the bone. Claudia Rowe is an award-winning journalist who has been twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Currently a staff writer at the Seattle Times , she has published work in numerous newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times, Mother Jones, Huffington Post, Women’s Day, Yes! and Seattle’s alternative weekly, The Stranger . She has been honored by the Society of Professional Journalists, the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University, and the Journalism Center on Children & Families, which awarded her a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism. Read more