You’ve stumbled onto the home page of Robert Remington — journalist, sometimes musician, and co-author of Runaway Devil.

The book, according to my oldest sister, is “really good.” You can read the reviews and decide for yourself but, so far, the response has been 95% favourable. Thanks to everyone who have given it five-star status at Chapters-Indigo (as of this writing) and who have posted those fab reader reviews on Amazon.

When I’m not writing I’m usually playing music. When I’m not playing music, I’m out with my Piper, my Golden Retriever.

Lately I’ve re-discovered beer. I blame my friend Grant Robertson, who recently took me to the Beer Bistro in Toronto, and my colleague Jason van Rassel, who I think should revive his beer blog.

Puppet masters and other killers

A Toronto judge recently sentenced a teen killer to life, calling Melissa Todorovic a “puppet master” for using sexual blackmail to convince an older male to murder a perceived rival.

But her crime, committed when Todorovic was 15, pales in comparison to that of Canada’s original puppet master, Runaway Devil. Known as JR in court documents, she was a mere 12 when she convinced her older lover, 23-year-old Jeremy Steinke, to kill at her behest.

JR’s story is told in the  new book Runaway Devil: How Forbidden Love Drove a 12-Year-Old to Murder Her Family, written by myself and colleague Sherri Zickefoose. We  describe how JR went from a suburban, middle-class honour student  to become Canada’s youngest multiple murderer when sentenced in the summer of 2007 for the brutal stabbing deaths of her father, mother, and eight-year-old brother.

Although she denied that she and Jeremy had concocted a premeditated plan to kill her family, it was clear from evidence that she, indeed, was the mastermind. As we write on Page 85: “JR’s friends also say she was the one pressuring Jeremy to kill her parents. In several overhead conversations, JR appeared to be the puppet master and Jeremy her marionette.”

The book contains previously unpublished details of the notorious crime that shocked a nation.

For author interviews or more information, visit my Runaway Devil site.

To hear an interview with the authors, click here.

Runaway Devil now on sale

Runaway Devil has turned out to be a bit of a runaway hit. It is currently on three bestseller lists in Canada.

Runaway Devil, written by myself and Calgary Herald crime writer Sherri Zickefoose, tells the story of Canada’s youngest multiple killer, a 12-year-old girl who murdered her family by enlisting the help of her 23-year-old accomplice and lover, Jeremy Allan Steinke, who claimed to be a 300-year-old werewolf and boasted to an undercover cop that he drank blood.

It sounds sensational, and it is, but we’ve attempted to write not just a purely salacious true-crime book. Rather, we hope it  is a compelling exploration of  how someone so young could have been driven to something so heinous. Stabbed to death in the night were not just her mother and father, but also her eight-year-old brother. In the killers’ warped sense of benevolence, they felt it would be best to send the boy to be with his parents in “the summerland.”

The book explores the killers’ upbringing and background, their fascination with death metal music, violent movies and the goth subculture. It has been, at times, an emotional journey, and we hope that we have honoured the memories of the victims and the work of investigators. A portion of the proceeds are donated to the victim assistance unit of the Medicine Hat Police Service and to Rockhaven, a men’s recovery centre in Sudbury, Ont.