On first appearances, Robert Hansen seemed to have it all. As a mild-mannered family man, he ran a successful bakery and held world-record hunting trophies that brought him respect among his peers. But behind this carefully cultivated exterior lurked a cold-blooded serial killer.

Big game animals no longer satisfied his urge to kill; he needed a different sort of prey. Hansen sought out women in Anchorage’s red-light district and flew them out to the Alaska wilderness where he hunted them down for sport. Many women who had encountered Hansen warned authorities of his dark side, but their pleas for action were ignored. Hansen was eventually arrested and confessed to the murders of 17 women. Tapes of this confession have been lost for 35 years, but now, together with the testimony of his friends, victims, and the officers involved, The Butcher Baker: Mind of a Monster finally pieces together the truth about Robert Hansen.