A couple -- Gabby Petito and Brian Laundrie -- heads off in a Van, across America. A single person returns. He's asked where his fiancée is. Shrugs. Dunno. Not sayin'. The police find the body and declare it was murder. Who dunnit?
One thing is: why the huge attention on this one murder? There are 60 homicides a day in the US, after all. Why is this one so different? Clearly it's a handsome young couple and they'd been Vlogging as "Van Life". Still, one does wonder, and that's a big topic at #GabbyPetito, is it racism, and all, so I'm not going to go there.
What this story did was to remind me of another story. The one of another murder (or murders) in 1974, told in "And the Sea Shall Tell". In the Gabby Petito case, a couple goes out; only one person comes back. On Palmyra Atoll, two couples go out on the sailing ketch Sea Wind, only one couple comes back. Vince Bugliosi tells the story in his terrific book. They also made a movie of it. Far more fascinating and mysterious, than this homicide, as they already have the obvious suspect in their sights. Brian Laundrie, the young man who returned alone in the van, is a "person of interest".
Vince Bugliosi, by the way, also authored Helter Skelter, the true story of his prosecution of the Manson Family. Also a great read. It was, iirc, the only time Vince prosecuted. In the Sea Shall Tell, he defended Stephanie Sterns, the girlfriend of the ultimately convicted murderer, Buck Walker.
I went to look for my copy of Sea to re-read it. Couldn't find, so I've ordered another copy, this time in Kindle. That's a fine way to read, I've come to conclude. OK, it's not paper and it doesn't have the smell and feel of a good old-fashioned book. But it's light, is easy to read in bed with its backlighting, you can change the size of the font, you can look up words as you go, you can highlight and bookmark. Lots of pluses...
