Ricardo Ainslie is a psychologist-psychoanalyst who teaches at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is a Professor in the Department of Educational Psychology and an affiliate faculty member in American Studies and at the Center for Mexican American Studies.

• Contents Preface Acknowledgments 1. The Row 2. Huff Creek Road 3. The Arrests 4. The Unraveling 5. Planet Beto 6. An Uneasy Return 7. Not the 1920s 8. Prison Kites 9. The Prosecution's Case 10. Footprints and Tattoos 11. The Verdict 12. Blood Ties Notes

"Ricardo Ainslie is that rare writer: a scholar who is also a riveting storyteller. Long Dark Road is a deep, haunting, and impressively researched book that deserves a wide readership." Dan Rather, CBS News "This book truly is a long, dark road--but one that leads to a profound understanding of human nature. It describes the journey of a healer into the pathology of a killer and the wounded community he left behind. One feels both enlightened and consoled by Ricardo Ainslie's probing and empathic mind." Lawrence Wright, author and New Yorker staff writer "Unique and penetrating... In its portrait of Bill King, Long Dark Road offers a glimpse into the mind of a killer that is unnervingly intimate. While never losing sight of the horror of the crime King was convicted of committing, Ainslie makes us understand, through dogged investigation and temperate empathy, the forces that helped warp an otherwise bright and promising individual into one of the most notorious criminals of our time." Stephen Harrigan, author of Gates of the Alamo, A Natural State, Water and Light, and Comanche Midnight

Ricardo Ainslie is a psychologist-psychoanalyst who teaches at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is a Professor in the Department of Educational Psychology and an affiliate faculty member in American Studies and at the Center for Mexican American Studies.

• Contents Preface Acknowledgments 1. The Row 2. Huff Creek Road 3. The Arrests 4. The Unraveling 5. Planet Beto 6. An Uneasy Return 7. Not the 1920s 8. Prison Kites 9. The Prosecution's Case 10. Footprints and Tattoos 11. The Verdict 12. Blood Ties Notes

"Ricardo Ainslie is that rare writer: a scholar who is also a riveting storyteller. Long Dark Road is a deep, haunting, and impressively researched book that deserves a wide readership." Dan Rather, CBS News "This book truly is a long, dark road--but one that leads to a profound understanding of human nature. It describes the journey of a healer into the pathology of a killer and the wounded community he left behind. One feels both enlightened and consoled by Ricardo Ainslie's probing and empathic mind." Lawrence Wright, author and New Yorker staff writer "Unique and penetrating... In its portrait of Bill King, Long Dark Road offers a glimpse into the mind of a killer that is unnervingly intimate. While never losing sight of the horror of the crime King was convicted of committing, Ainslie makes us understand, through dogged investigation and temperate empathy, the forces that helped warp an otherwise bright and promising individual into one of the most notorious criminals of our time." Stephen Harrigan, author of Gates of the Alamo, A Natural State, Water and Light, and Comanche Midnight

Ricardo Ainslie is a psychologist-psychoanalyst who teaches at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is a Professor in the Department of Educational Psychology and an affiliate faculty member in American Studies and at the Center for Mexican American Studies.

• Contents Preface Acknowledgments 1. The Row 2. Huff Creek Road 3. The Arrests 4. The Unraveling 5. Planet Beto 6. An Uneasy Return 7. Not the 1920s 8. Prison Kites 9. The Prosecution's Case 10. Footprints and Tattoos 11. The Verdict 12. Blood Ties Notes

"Ricardo Ainslie is that rare writer: a scholar who is also a riveting storyteller. Long Dark Road is a deep, haunting, and impressively researched book that deserves a wide readership." Dan Rather, CBS News "This book truly is a long, dark road--but one that leads to a profound understanding of human nature. It describes the journey of a healer into the pathology of a killer and the wounded community he left behind. One feels both enlightened and consoled by Ricardo Ainslie's probing and empathic mind." Lawrence Wright, author and New Yorker staff writer "Unique and penetrating... In its portrait of Bill King, Long Dark Road offers a glimpse into the mind of a killer that is unnervingly intimate. While never losing sight of the horror of the crime King was convicted of committing, Ainslie makes us understand, through dogged investigation and temperate empathy, the forces that helped warp an otherwise bright and promising individual into one of the most notorious criminals of our time." Stephen Harrigan, author of Gates of the Alamo, A Natural State, Water and Light, and Comanche Midnight