Murder in the Dollhouse - by Rich Cohen (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A nail-biting, edge-of-your-seat investigation into the mysterious disappearance of Jennifer Dulos and the aftershocks that rattled a wealthy suburb.

Rich Cohen's Murder in the Dollhouse is the chilling, unputdownable story of Jennifer Dulos, a beautiful, rich suburban mother who dropped her kids off at the New Canaan Country School one morning and vanished. Her body has never been found.

Dulos was in the midst of an ugly divorce--one of the most contentious in Connecticut state history. The couple, a beautiful, highly connected pair, met at Brown University, had five children, and led what appeared to be a charmed life. In the wake of her disappearance, Dulos's husband and his girlfriend were arrested. He killed himself on the day he was supposed to report to court; she was tried and convicted of conspiracy to commit murder.

A gripping story of status, wealth, love, and hate, Murder in the Dollhouse peers beneath the sparkling veneer of propriety that surrounded the Duloses to uncover the origins and motivations of a crime that has become a national obsession.

Review Quotes

"In the new book Murder in the Dollhouse, Rich Cohen, who reported the story for Air Mail magazine, delves into the case, constructing a true crime tale that's equal parts gripping, sad and enraging." --Marion Winik, The Washington Post

"It is to Rich Cohen's credit that, in his never-boring Murder in the Dollhouse, he pauses over 'the media's obsession with dead white women' and declares outright that the Dulos murder was 'about money--it's always about money' . . . Therein lies the tale, and Cohen, a prolific journalist and author of fourteen books, is awfully good at telling it. With great skill he sketches the origin story of Jennifer Farber." --Louis Bayard, The New York Times

"Disquieting . . . Cohen's gifts as a storyteller are ample; he leaves the reader with a heightened appreciation for her, her promise as a writer, her devotion as a parent and why she found herself, like so many women, in a marriage fearing for her life." --Alex Belth, The Wall Street Journal

"In this gripping work of non-fiction, journalist and bestselling author Rich Cohen investigates the life and death of the monied Ivy League grad and the tabloid frenzy that came next." --Town & Country

"Cohen turns this tabloid whodunit into a searching examination of the American dream, our fascination with lurid tragedy and the cost of perfection." --The New York Times

"What Truman Capote did for Holcomb, Kansas, with In Cold Blood, Rich Cohen has done for New Canaan, Connecticut, with Murder in the Dollhouse. This book isn't just true crime, it's sociology in action." --Lili Anolik, author of Didion and Babitz

"In Murder in the Dollhouse, Rich Cohen takes us beyond the tabloid headlines of the Jennifer Dulos story to chronicle--in devastating detail--the tragic unraveling of a marriage and the shattering of the American dream. With brilliant, razor-sharp writing and deep reporting of the case, he proves to be the perfect narrator as we witness two lives on an inevitable collision course." --Katie Couric

"Rich Cohen takes what might be dismissed as a tabloid story of murder and mines it for its deeper, weightier resonances, revealing a painfully human (and perhaps quintessentially American) story of a Kafkaesque divorce, its ripple effects on family and friends, and the destructive power of relentless aspiration." --Megan Abbot, New York Times bestselling author of Beware the Woman

"There can be no justice for Jennifer Dulos or those who loved her, but this book will stand as something close: written with elegance and clarity, impeccably reported, and filled with genuine heart, we come to know this bright light of a woman whose charmed life turned into the worst kind of nightmare." --Dani Shapiro, author of Signal Fires

"Set in a world I know well--the cosseted and manicured bubble of Fairfield County, Connecticut--Murder in the Dollhouse contrasts the extreme elegance against the grit of a heinous crime. Jennifer Farber was the tragically misdirected woman who had everything going for her--on the surface. Red flags flapping in a windstorm didn't alert her to the mess that would be her marriage to Fotis Dulos. Rich Cohen has done a fantastic reporting job. It's the details that will make you gasp." --Lisa Birnbach, author of The Official Preppy Handbook and twenty other books

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