The No. 1 bestseller behind the ITV drama ‘Des’

Killing For Company

Brian Masters has given us a full, well-ordered, dispassionate account of Nilsen's life and crimes

Brian Masters can rest assured that the job he undertook with such obvious doubts was one worth doing

Probably the best thing of its kind since In Cold Blood...a classic study in criminal mentality

Quite brilliant in its assimilation of the facts... Killing for Company is a book that needed to be written, and has been executed with extreme skill and good sense

Simultaneously gripping and repellent... I feel confident that I will not read again in 1985 a more fascinating and repulsive tale, be it fact or fiction

The book is a perceptive and at times coldly brutal assessment of Nilsen's psychology

An important book which screams to be read

A compelling and remarkable book... through Masters' fine writing the reader suspends his nausea for the crimes, and concentrates with Nilsen on his motives and himself

Masters has written an extraordinary book, and his achievement has been the ability to recount horrific details without descending to the lurid sensationalism of the instant books and Fleet Street reports

'Killing For Company must stand as one of the most remarkable and accurate accounts ever written of the singular relationship between a mass murderer and a society. Brian Masters, in the writing, has achieved the impossible. Though dealing with sensational and horrific matters he has managed, God knows how, to treat his material with such objectivity and restraint that what we have is not a penny dreadful from the Hammer House of Horror, but a bloody masterpiece'.

Without any doubt one of the most remarkable, complete and most humanely informative accounts of a murderer's mind ever achieved... the book is far superior to any previous English book of its kind and deserves to serve as a model for all future attempts in this genre

A meticulous study of the dark intricacies of the human mind

Brian Masters has written over twenty books on subjects as diverse as French literature, the dukedoms in Great Britain, E.F. Benson and Marie Corelli. His groundbreaking study of mass murderer Dennis Nilsen, Killing for Company, won the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction in 1985. He is also highly regarded for his journalism.

The definitive story of the Dennis Nilsen case featured in BBC's The Nilsen Tapes, and the book behind ITV's Des, starring David Tennant 
 
***WINNER OF THE GOLD DAGGER AWARD FOR CRIME NON-FICTION and THE NUMBER ONE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER*** 
__________________ 
Dennis Nilsen, who died in May 2018, admitted to killing at least 15 people before his arrest in 1983. This ground-breaking criminal study of his killings was written with Nilsen's full cooperation, resulting in a fascinating - and horrifying - portrait of the man who worshipped death. 
 
In February 1983, residents of Muswell Hill had been plagued by blocked drains. When a plumber was called to investigate, he discovered a large blockage of biological material. To his horror, it appeared to be formed of human flesh and bones. 
 
The next day, local resident Dennis Nilsen was arrested. 
 
'Are we talking about one body or two?' a detective asked. Nilsen replied 'Fifteen or sixteen, since 1978. I'll tell you everything.' 
 
Within days he had confessed to fifteen gruesome murders over a period of four years. His victims, mostly young gay men at a time when society cared little for them, had been overlooked. Killing for Company is a unique study of a murderer's mind, essential reading for true crime aficionados. 
__________________ 
'You really have to read this extraordinary book to get a full flavour of the weirdness of Nilsen and his crimes' SUNDAY TIMES 
 
'A seminal look into the criminal mind' DAILY MAIL 
 
'Brian Masters has given us a full, well-ordered, dispassionate account of Nilsen's life and crimes' THE TIMES 
 
'Without any doubt one of the most remarkable, complete and most humanely informative accounts of a murderer's mind ever achieved... the book is far superior to any previous English book of its kind and deserves to serve as a model for all future attempts in this genre' NEW SOCIETY 
 
'The book is a perceptive and at times coldly brutal assessment of Nilsen's psychology' MIRROR 
 
'A comprehensive and compelling account' FINANCIAL TIMES 
 
'Brian Masters can rest assured that the job he undertook with such obvious doubts was one worth doing' SPECTATOR 
 
'Probably the best thing of its kind since In Cold Blood . . . a classic study in criminal mentality' YORKSHIRE POST 
 
'Killing For Company must stand as one of the most remarkable and accurate accounts ever written of the singular relationship between a mass murderer and a society . . . a bloody masterpiece.' BERYL BAINBRIDGE 
 
'A truly awesome tale, brilliantly told' LITERARY REVIEW 
 
'A meticulous study of the dark intricacies of the human mind' THE BOOKBAG 
 
'Masters has written an extraordinary book, and his achievement has been the ability to recount horrific details without descending to the lurid sensationalism of the instant books and Fleet Street reports' POLICE 
 
'A compelling and remarkable book ... through Masters' fine writing the reader suspends his nausea for the crimes, and concentrates with Nilsen on his motives and himself' THE LISTENER

The Evil That Men Do

A penetrating investigation into the nature of good and evil by the author of Killing for Company.

A welcome link in the chain of understanding: a work of ambition and complexity underpinned by an obvious desire to grasp the fundamental nature of ourselves

An exercise in moral philosophy ... imbued with the writer's kindly wisdom or quivering indignation.  [Masters'] accounts of our brutality and sadism to ourselves and our fellow creatures, although not lavish and never unnecessarily dwelt upon, harrow us the more keenly just because they are so well-written and admirably chosen.

His discussion of evil and good is calmly, even cooly detailed.  It is not merely by his compassionate distancing that Masters' study manages to engage the reader; his research seems to have been exhaustive and copious.  His range is impressive.

Brian Masters has written over twenty books on subjects as diverse as French literature, the dukedoms in Great Britain, E.F. Benson and Marie Corelli. His groundbreaking study of mass murderer Dennis Nilsen, Killing for Company, won the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction in 1985. He is the author of the critically acclaimed The Shrine of Jeffrey Dahmer and The Evil that Men Do. He is also highly regarded for his journalism, in particular his weekly column in the Mail on Sunday's magazine Night and Day. He lives in France.

Born of a preoccupation with saints and sinners, The Evil That Men Do is Brian Masters' investigation into the nature of good and evil, and the different ways in which they can be manifested. It examines the fundamental questions of why we are as we are: why we are good, why we care for one another, why we can be altruistic and kind as well as selfish and cruel. 
 
According to science, we are prisoners of our genetic inheritance. Are our impulses therefore to some extent inescapable, compelling us to behave in a certain manner, irrespective of the guidelines imposed by instinct or civilization? Or can we determine our individual patterns of behaviour? Do we really have a choice? 
 
Using a diverse multitude of examples, from St. Francis of Assisi, Audrey Hepburn, Bruce Chatwin and Bob Geldof to the Marquis de Sade, Adolf Hitler and Peter Sutcliffe, from the Spanish Inquisition to Nazi Germany to the Vietnam War, Brian Masters examines this age-old yet intensely contemporary subject. At a time when civilization seems on the verge of meltdown, he has produced an incisive, thoughtful and provocative meditation on a fundamental human question.

The Dukes

'An excellent book. I found it completely fascinating, with new and delightful information on every page' - Auberon Waugh

Excellent mightily researched and readable. Absorbing through so many pages

Splendidly painstaking and enormously readable

With a keen sense of precedence and an admirable grasp of the British peerage system, he darts from duke to duke... racing up and down the genealogies

Brian Masters has written on a wide range of subjects, from dukes to gorillas to murderers. His account of the addictive killer Dennis Nilsen, Killing for Company, won the Gold Dagger Award in 1985, and he followed this with studies of Jeffrey Dahmer and Rosemary West. In between, there were biographies of John Aspinall, Georgina Duchess of Devonshire, Marie Corelli, and E. F. Benson, as well as a book on India and a celebration of Great Hostesses (such as Cunard and Colefax). His book on moral philosophy was entitled The Evil That Men Do. He also published his own memoirs, Getting Personal, in 2002.

The origins of the non-royal dukes in the British peerage divide nicely into Tudor looters, Royal bastards, opportunist generals, territorial, metropolitan or Scottish magnates. Lloyd George said that a duke, fully equipped, cost more than a dreadnought to maintain and with their palaces, possessions and retinues, they are nearly all splendid. Some of them are, of course, now poor; some of them have great wealth; some of them hit every headline and others are obscure. But within each duchy, Brian Masters tells the story of quaint grandees determined to survive. 
 
The Dukes is an essential guide that provides vital biographical information and explores the history of the dukes in unprecedented depth. This revised edition includes new information which was not available on first publication, and brings up to date the accounts of families whose titles have passed to a subsequent generation in the intervening years.

Brian Masters

The Trial Of Rosemary West

Captivated by the hit ITV true crime drama DES? Uncover the truth behind the trial of Rosemary West, another of Britain's most infamous serial killers. 
'Anyone reading this brilliant book will wonder whether justice was really done.' Evening Standard 
 
In 1994, Frederick West was arrested and accused of murdering twelve young women. But it was the trial of his wife, Rosemary West, that became Britain's serial-killer trial of the century... 
 
Detained for the murder of the twelve women found at 25 Cromwell Street, Gloucester, Frederick West hung himself on New Year's Day 1995. The case had enraged the nation, and the subsequent trial of Rosemary for the same crimes caused a media sensation. 
 
How are ordinary human beings driven to become serial killers? How did this psychopath ensnare so many women? And how much was Rosemary truly involved? 
 
Brian Masters attended the Rosemary West trial on a daily basis. In "She Must Have Known" he produces a penetrating study of the sexual obsession that led to a series of horrifying and measured killings, ultimately leaving the reader to make up their own mind on the guilt of Rosemary West. 
_______________________ 
 
'By far the most interesting book on the subject... profound and illuminating.' Sunday Telegraph 
'Another serious, compelling account of a serial killer.' The Sunday Times 
'A classic of criminological literature.' Spectator 
 
What readers are saying: 
 
***** 'Brave and compelling and beautifully written. And it will certainly make you pause to think.' 
***** 'I am grateful for the existence of writers like Brian Masters . . . This is an excellent book.' 
***** 'Gives you the opportunity to consider the evidence against Rose West as a juror would rather than as a tabloid reader.'

Brian Masters

Books by Brian Masters

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter