Wish You Were Here: A Murdered Girl, a Brother's Quest and the Hunt for a Canadian Serial Killer

by John Allore, Patricia Pearson

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

As compelling as Michelle McNamara's I'll Be Gone in the Dark or James Ellroy's My Dark Places , this is the story of a brother's lifelong determination to find the truth about his sister's death, a police force that was ignoring the cases of missing and murdered women, and, to the surprise of everyone involved, a previously undiscovered serial killer.

In the fall of 1978 teenager Theresa Allore went missing near Sherbrooke, Quebec. She wasn't seen again until the spring thaw revealed her body in a creek only a few kilometers away. Shrugging off her death as a result of 1970s drug culture, police didn't investigate.

Patricia Pearson started dating Theresa's brother John during the aftermath of Theresa's death. Though the two teens would go their separate ways, the family's grief, obsession with justice and desire for the truth never left Patricia. Little did she know, the shockwaves of Theresa's death would return to her life repeatedly over the next forty years.

In 2001, John had just moved to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, with his wife and young children, when the cops came to the door. They had determined that a young girl had been murdered and buried in the basement. John If these cops could look for this young girl, why had nobody even tried to find out what happened to Theresa? Unable to rest without closure, he reached out to Patricia, by now an accomplished crime journalist and author, and together they found answers far bigger and more alarming than they could have imagined--and a legacy of violence that refused to end.

Genres: True Crime

384 pages, Paperback

Published May 3, 2022

About the author

John Allore is the co-author of the Canadian true crime best seller Wish You Were Here and has worked in victim advocacy since 2002. His website, Who Killed Theresa, is one of the first crime blogs on the internet. It began as an investigation into the unsolved murder of his sister, Theresa Allore. The website is widely consulted by police agencies, public officials, academics and students for its volume of information. In 2017 John started the podcast, Who Killed Theresa, which focuses on unsolved murders, as well as other issues of criminal and social justice. John is currently the Acting Director of Budget & Management Services for the city of Durham, North Carolina.

Forthcoming: That Case Is Not Here, from Rowman and Littlefield.

Reviews

[Lily · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a touching testament to the persistence and compassion of a brother, who is dedicated to seeking justice for his murdered sister. Even over forty years later, Theresa Allore's disappearance and murder continues to haunt many. As a woman who grew up in both Ontario and in Québec, I feel a connection to Theresa and the other female homicide victims mentioned in this book, such as Manon Dubé, Louise Camirand, Ursula Schulz, even though I wasn't born at the time of their killings. It's disgusting how callous and indifferent authorities were, the blatant misogyny towards victims of sexual assault and homicide continues to this day. I sincerely wish for justice and closure to Theresa's family. John and Patricia worked so hard on this book. My sole dislike: the slight racial micro aggressions, "typical middle-class white family", and the need to mention that Theresa's friend was black, as if white is the default.