Heart Full of Lies: A True Story of Desire and Death

Pocket, 2004. Near Fine. Former Seattle police officer and crime author Rule (Small Sacrifices; Dead by Sunset, etc.) knows a good drama when she finds one: it involves love, betrayal, greed and violence. In the story of Liysa Northon, a woman who mu rdered her third husband, Chris Northon, in order to collect his insurance money, Rule has found a real-life soap opera. In the fall of 2000, Liysa co nvinced Chris to go on a camping trip with her and their small son in the r emote forests of Oregon. But the idyllic vacation didn't last long; Liysa w ould later admit to ending her husband's life by shooting him in the head i n an act of "self-defense." From where she sits today (in an Oregon state p rison), she still professes to have shot Chris only in innocence and fear-e motions she said were caused by her years as a victim of domestic violence. But according to her husband's parents and other sources, Liysa is a manip ulative sociopath who spent years crafting a public façade of abuse persuas ive enough to justify the cold-blooded murder of her husband. Rule has done an impressive amount of research to reconstruct the history of Liysa's cri me and the stories of the main people involved, interviewing dozens of poli ce officers, investigators and private citizens across the country. And if the author's prose is somewhat flat, the fascinating and perplexing drama s hould be more than enough to keep most readers turning pages.