The shocking story of one of the most notorious female serial killers in American history from an author who shows real mastery of the true crime genre (NPR). In 1891 Jane Toppan a proper New England matron embarked on a profession as a private nurse. Selfless and good-natured she worked for some of Boston s most prominent families but they had no idea what they were welcoming into their homes. Her dark past of tragedy abuse and mental illness was carefully hidden. No one who knew Jane as a nurse had any idea that she was morbidly obessed with autopsies or that she conducted her own after-hours experiments on patients deriving sexual satisfaction in their slow agonizing deaths from poison. Self-schooled in the art of murder Jane was just beginning her career as the most prolific domestic fiend of the nineteenth century.