Five books for newbies

1 - The Complete and Essential Jack the Ripper by Paul Begg and John Bennett (2013)

The Complete and Essential, published in 2013 by two of the best ripperologists in the world, gives a complete overview of the case and of both contemporary and modern investigations. The book covers all relevant aspects without overwhelming the readers with details he might get lost into. This is probably the best book to start for newbies who want to approach this argument.

2 - The Complete History of Jack the Ripper by Philip Sugden (1994)

Philip Sugden was an historian who felt ripperology was engulfed in myth and unreliable theories, therefore he decided he wanted to set the point straight about hard facts. His book presents the whole case from scratch and it's very good and successful in doing so. His favorite suspect is Severin Klosowski (also known as George Chapman) who is after all a credible culprit, so this is not necessarily a bad aspect.

3 - Jack the Ripper: The Facts by Paul Begg (2004)

In The Facts ripperologist Paul Begg covers in detail every single aspect of the whole case: from potential victims to the canonical victims, from suspects to popular culture, based on both historical documents and new findings and using classical and modern investigation techniques. The author explores deeply every topic he touches thus giving the reader a complete and well research knowledge on the case. Probably the best book about Jack the Ripper ever written.

4 - Jack the Ripper: Scotland Yard Investigates by Stewart P. Evans and Donald Rumbelow (2006)

As the title suggests, the two authors describe the investigation by the Victorian police on the Whitechapel murders, thus explaining what evaluations they made and why, and what impact the press had on them. This is a very valuable book to understand the basics of the Jack the Ripper case, because before reading and evaluating new theories one needs to know what trails the police followed back then and what they considered reliable and what was not.

5 - Jack the Ripper by Paul Begg and John Bennett (2017)

With the help of CGI technology this book reconstructs what places looked like in Victorian Whitechapel in 1888. To have a complete understanding of the facts, one has to know also where they happened and this unique book is very successful in doing so.