If You Tell

First of all, I mean no disrespect to the sisters who endured the horrors detailed within the pages of If You Tell. I spent most of this book viscerally disgusted by the fact that a human being could do any of this to other human beings, let alone her own daughters. I feel for them; the trauma they suffered should not be minimized, and their stories should be told, so long as they wish it.

I will give credit to Olsen where credit is due: this is an incredibly compelling story. However, the same cannot necessarily be said about the storytelling. The structure of the book puzzled me: it seemed linear, except when it wasn't. Too many of the approximately ninety chapters (no joke) largely seemed to restate facts that had already been covered, making the book a slog despite relatively easy reading. Olsen's frequent employment of line breaks for emphasis quickly became a pet peeve, as did his use of “at once” to juxtapose two essential synonyms (i.e.—and I'm paraphrasing, because I've already returned the book—”It was at once repulsive and disgusting”).

I only saw If You Tell through to the end because I had to know what happened next. Some people surely will—and do—love this book; ultimately, I was not one of them.

One of the worst written books I have read. Please avoid this. Hardly a thing I can say about it.

Absolutely horrific! I had a hard time reading through this book, but managed to get to the end. Gregg Olsen takes the most heartbreaking cases and brings them to the public.

Incredible true story about one of the worst moms in history. I had to constantly remind myself that this story was true as the horrors were so over-the-top evil that they were difficult for a psychologically average person to comprehend as possible. As a consistent true crime consumer, it was a new case I had never heard about. The author has a clear voice and determination to tell the victim's stories.

What a gripping true story. I can't fathom the pain the Knoteck girls felt but I sure can understand how crazy their lives were.

This is the true story of Michelle (Shelly) Knoteck and her husband Dave. Shelly was wired very different than most and from an early age it was apparent she had issues. Shelly and Dave collectively killed three individuals and abused and tortured their own daughters. The manipulation Shelly used was insane to read and quite sad to see how quickly narcissistic people can make their victims feel loyal to them. Definitely worth reading!

If you want to further understand the Sylvia Likens case—how kids can be in the middle of someone's abuse and torture and not tell an outsider, and even participate—this is the book to read.

I have heard that Gregg Olsen is one of the best true crime writers. This story, starring Michelle “ Shelly” Knotek, and her clueless third husband shows how they got away with torture and murder for years. My friend Anna read this and said it was one messed up book and I needed a break from fiction so I decided to shift gears and go back to my favorite thing's true crime. I finished this 411-page book in three days so I can tell you it's good. It is so good that I have to sit down and look at other true crime books Gregg Olson has written.

Shelly's daughters and nephew had no idea how evil she really was. She degraded them, broke them down, so they had no idea what was normal, or what she was truly capable of. With his mindless acceptance, compliance, and avoidance, David Knotek made her job much easier. He spent much of his life at work, only coming home on weekends. He mindlessly carried out whatever she said. Unbelievable. Her other 2 husbands left their children as sacrifices to get away from her. David wanted to see the best in her without seeing the damage she was causing even to him.
I can see this happening. The rest of us travel to the other side of the street to stay away from people like this. We sometimes see the damage but we don't know how to help without causing more harm. The horrendous things they do and get away with, because no one gets close enough, blind and deaf to dysfunction and plain bizarre, because “She's crazy. “ I'm sure there's teachers, neighbors, mailmen -and the coworkers -with stories that are just way out there. And likely if they had reported them, the police would've done exactly what they did when Nikki and Lara approached them. This story should make us all look a little closer. There are many more Kathy's out there. More children need help much sooner than these three girls.