I feel that it is needlessly obfuscate, trite, irresolute

1) Lack of New Content: I found the audiobook repetitive, offering nothing new compared to other similar works that I have read. Especially as I have already read of some of these studies numerous times before.

2) Deviation from Subject Matter: The author spends too much time on irrelevant details and social biases, which I feel are misplaced in this context. Being labeled creepy is obviously not deserving of evil, not is having mental illness. This is not a groundbreaking idea.

3) Naivety and logical fallacies: The author appears naive about the concept of evil people, diluting the severity of heinous acts as to something ordinary people are capable of, and conflating ordinary things people do and things with what can be seen as evil.

4) Unintended Normalization of Evil: Instead of providing a deeper understanding, the book seems to normalize evil by making it less definable.

A disclaimer - The Potential for Bias: The author is a psychologist and researcher who specializes in criminal psychology and the science of memory. As such, we must at the very least suspect or look out for the author whitewashing the subject or showing partisan bias, possibly to promote or maintain their professional relevance. This may be of course be completely untrue, and I make no accusations, but it's something to bear in in mind when taking in information from this source.

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1 person found this helpful

Insightful, intelligent & extremely well presented

Julia Shaw presents an insightful and intelligent look at the concept of Evil. Thoroughly recommend.

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2 people found this helpful

a very thought provoking listen

You may never use the word evil again after listening to this, are you willing to have your options changed?

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Goody-goody lecturing

Opinionated goody-goody lecturing only saved by some interesting third party research and references. In combination with the narration rubbed me up the wrong way.

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The knowledge behind the voice

How the author draws you into explore your own thoughts and feelings on very deep topics

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Not bad

Find it off putting when the author doesn’t know how to pronounce basic words like chasm and albeit. Undermines the work as you wonder about her level of education, though she reads well.

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1 person found this helpful

Fascinating!

Such an interesting and well researched book. Very well delivered and a must listen for fans of Bad People.

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Great insight

very interesting, not always an easy listen but as a part time psych student very relevant to the theme of why do people do bad things.

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Excellent introduction to the psychology of evil

I really enjoyed this book!
Julia Shaw's premise is that evil is essentially a gross oversimplification/ dismissive term and that instead we should 'pick apart' and scrutinise the behaviours and their underlying motives, and she illustrates this across a wide range of topics.
As the author says herself in the introduction - this book is not intended as an exhaustive compendium on the psychology of morality (arguably no such title exists, but more lengthy analyses have been done by psychologists like Steven Pinker [the Better Angels of Our Nature is 37 hours long!]), but this works wonderfully as a shorter text that is enjoyable and can be read in a few days (probably a single day if you had a full day free!). I also like how Julia is not afraid to include her own views and some details from her own life, it adds a great deal of humanity and character to the book.
If you come from a psychology/psychiatry background (I am a psychiatrist myself), you will be familiar with many of the studies (e.g. Stanford prison experiments, Milgram experments etc.) but she offers a fresh take/ modern update on many of the earlier conclusions of such studies, and it never feels boring.
Additionally, I think this book is a perfect example of where it works really well for the author to be narrating her own work. It would be really great if she has opportunity to go back and narrate The Memory Illusion (her previous book) as well.

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19 people found this helpful

Incredible!

The narration was completely engaging and Dr Julia Shaw explored controversial and fascinating areas of what makes a person 'evil' in a way that is understandable to anyone with or without experience in psychology.

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4 people found this helpful