Dead by Sunset: Perfect Husband, Perfect Killer?

Ann Rule

Feb 2000 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

From bestselling author Ann Rule comes the true story of Bradly Morris Cunningham, the handsome and successful entrereneur who married five different women and destroyed each of them.

The author of eight New York Times bestsellers, Ann Rule first won nationwide acclaim with The Stranger Beside Me, about serial killer Ted Bundy. Her Crime Files volumes, based on fascinating case histories, have assured her reputation as our premier chronicler of crime. Now the former Seattle policewoman brings us the horrific account of a charismatic man adored by beautiful and brilliant women who always gave him what he wanted...sex, money, and even their very lives.

When attorney Cheryl Keeton's brutally bludgeoned body was found in her van in the fast lane of an Oregon freeway, her husband, Brad Cunningham, was the likely suspect. But there was no solid evidence linking him to the crime. He married again, for the fifth time, and his stunning new wife, a physician named Sara, adopted his three sons. They all settled down to family life on a luxurious estate. But gradually, their marriage became a nightmare...

In this gripping account of Cheryl's murder, Ann Rule takes us from Brad's troubled boyhood to one of the most bizarre trials in legal history, uncovering multiple marriages, financial manipulations, infidelities, and monstrous acts of harassment and revenge along the way. Dead By Sunset is Ann Rule at her riveting best.

Ratings and reviews

Good story but, the book is really drug out.... it took me a long time to read as it was hard to keep my interest.

I really enjoy Ann Rule's books and this one was especially good. So happy Mr. Cunningham is exactly were this evil man belongs!

As usual, ann rule's talent for infusing cold hard facts of any true crime case with her objective yet colorful observations and extra personal details about the characters, make this book factual as well as riveting to read. I've heard people criticize her for the opinions and descriptions she includes about the many people within the case, saying that it is too biased to describe the victim as "beautiful" or the killer as "evil", but her detailed observations are the reason she is the queen of true crime. The dry facts of the crime itself are interesting, but her writing makes it magic.

About the author

Ann Rule wrote thirty-five New York Times bestsellers, all of them still in print. Her first bestseller was The Stranger Beside Me, about her personal relationship with infamous serial killer Ted Bundy. A former Seattle police officer, she used her firsthand expertise in all her books. For more than three decades, she was a powerful advocate for victims of violent crime. She lived near Seattle and died in 2015.