First of all, let me say that I've never read anything by Patricia Cornwell before, so I had no bias toward her position one way or another--I wasn't rooting for her to be wrong or right.

Second, for a book that was less than 400 pages long, and about one of the most famous serial killers in history, man this seemed to go on forever. I couldn't really say why; it wasn't badly written, and the subject matter certainly wasn't dull, but by the end I kept thinking "Why isn't this done yet? Are we still going? No, really, are we STILL GOING?" Maybe it was because she did a certain amount of nonchronological story telling, or maybe because there was quite a bit of author intrusion and commentary, and I find that very distracting.

As for the substance of the book...I don't know. Is it possible her hypothesis is correct? Absolutely, and she definitely builds a compelling case. My problem is that there are a lot of places where she's basically saying "I'm right because no one can prove I'm wrong," which...is true, because of the missing records from the time, but I think makes any definitive answer impossible. There's a difference between "I think this is what could have happened, based on the gaps in evidence from the time," and "This MUST be what happened, because the gaps in evidence from the time can't contradict me." I'm not saying that I think she's wrong, just that I'm not sure that anyone can be as sure as she claims to be. But overall it was an interesting, if slightly over-long, read, and it provides the basis for a new dialogue about the Ripper.