Alice & Gerald: A Homicidal Love Story
GENRE
CRIME DETECTIVE DRAMA
Core Theme
DEALING WITH OLD SECRETS
TIME PERIOD
1960s & '70s,2000s,1980s & '90s,Contemporary
COMPARABLE TITLES
MAKING A MURDERER, TRUE DETECTIVE.
CHARACTER LIST
• GERALD: 20S-70S. TACITURN, SECRETIVE, UNAPOLOGETIC.
• ALICE, 30S-70S. A FAITHFUL WIFE TO GERALD.
• VIRGINIA, 30S. GERALD'S EX-WIFE WHO HE MURDERS IN COLD BLOOD ALONG WITH THEIR TWO SMALL SONS.
• LONNIE TEEBEST, 30S-60S. THE COP WHO HAS BEEN WORKING ON THE CASE FOR MOST OF HIS CAREER.
Logline
Would you kill for love? Alice & Gerald Uden, a loving couple, murder five people and live happily ever after—while cops try for decades to piece together a petrifying tale of murder and secrets. Then, 40 years later, somebody finds a skeleton in a place where the killers never thought they'd look.
Target Audiences
Age: 18-34,35-54,55+
Target Gender: Female Leaning,Universal
Setting
Wyoming, Missouri
Based on a True Story
Yes
Publishing Details
Status: Yes: with a Publisher
Publisher: Prometheus Books (New York)
Year Published: 2019
Starting Description
In the early '70s, Gerald is a socially awkward janitor and three-time loser in love living in a boomtown trailer park when he meets Alice — who has a murderous secret that she reveals on the first night they make love. Desperate to keep Alice—a modern-day Lady Macbeth—he'll do anything. Anything.
Ending Description
Forty years after Alice's first murder, cops find a dead man's skeleton in a remote abandoned mine—shot once in the skull. It's Alice's 3rd husband. After Alice's arrest, the chivalrous Gerald—thinking they busted her for a different killing—confesses to three other murders in a surprise twist.
Group Specific
Information not completed
Hard Copy Available
Yes
ISBN
ISBN-10: 1633885127
Mature Audience Themes
Extreme Violence, Language/Profanity
Plot - Other Elements
Other
Plot - Premise
Other,Quest
Main Character Details
Name: Alice Uden
Age: 30-80
Gender: Female
Role: Antagonist
Key Traits: Narcisstic,Aggressive,Badass,Greedy,Villainous,Power Hungry,Secretive,Seductive,Unapologetic,Manipulative
Additional Character Details
Name: Gerald Uden
Age: 30-80
Gender: Male
Role: Antagonist
Key Traits: Aggressive,Clumsy,Criminal,Insecure,Naive,Masculine,Obedient,Uneducated,Secretive,Unapologetic
Additional Character Details
Name: Claire Martin
Age: 50-90
Gender: Female
Role: emotional
Key Traits: Decisive,Empathetic,Desperate,Engaging,Faithful,Heroic,Honorable,Blunt,Selfless,Outspoken,Strong Moral Code,Unapologetic
Additional Character Details
Name: Special Agent Lonnie TeBeest
Age: 30-60
Gender: Male
Role: protagonist
Key Traits: Adventurous,Complex,Decisive,Empathetic,Faithful,Heroic,Educated,Honorable,Masculine,Blunt,Selfless,Skillful,Outspoken,Sarcastic,Strong Moral Code,Unapologetic,Lone Wolf
Brief
Based on a true story. Alice and Gerald are a loving couple who share terrible secrets - they're both murderers, having each killed an ex spouse. Gerald also shot his two sons for good measure. They go about their lives for years until a dogged detective keeps the case alive long enough to bring them to justice.
What We Liked
- True crime;
- Smart and determined cops;
- Human nature at its worst;
- A good murder mystery is always compelling, and this one has all the right notes;
- The vast wasteland of mid-century Wyoming is almost a character in itself, and although you wouldn't expect these crimes from hard working middle Americans, evil is everywhere;
- If transformed into a whodunnit, it could be very appealing to good actors, and would make a enticing story for the many fans of true crime;
- As a limited run series, it would be a strong entry into the crowded true crime genre. People would be interested in whether or not these killers will be brought to justice, or it can be teased out with a reveal of who the murderers are at the end. Either way, it's a compelling tale of characters whose lives are filled with hubris, evil, and quiet desperation.
Synopsis
Wyoming, 1964. GERALD UDEN, 20s, leads a calm life with his first wife. In 1973, VIRGINIA comes to his door, asking him to appraise a rifle. Gerald ends up helping her out with her house, and she has two wild little boys she’s dealing with and no husband. She needs him, and the boys need a dad, so Gerald steps in. Virginia changed though, and asks for a divorce. Gerald falls into a depression and considered suicide. In 1976, he meets ALICE, a single mom with three ex husbands and five kids. She needs help with electrical work. They go fishing, and she’s candid and in control. Gerald is in love, and she confesses that she killed her third husband RON in self-defense and threw his body down a mineshaft - but no one came looking. Gerald keeps her secret.
He and Alice invite Gerald’s two young sons to stay with them, but Alice wants nothing to do with Virginia. Under the guise of a hunting trip, Gerald lures Virginia and the two boys into the woods and shoots them all in the head, then dumps their bodies in a lake.
Years go by. The detective who has these unsolved cases on his desk longer than any other is LONNIE TEBEEST. He questions everyone and starts excavation on an abandoned mineshaft where he believes bodies lie. He knows Gerald and Alice are murderers but can’t prove it. His bosses are getting tired of the very cold case. CLAIRE, Virginia’s elderly mother, keeps TeBeest searching for answers. He gets help from nationally renowned law enforcement officials and a new sheriff who starts a cold case department. Finally, a second excavation of the mineshaft produces Ron’s skull with a bullet wound, so they call in Alice and she confesses to the murder. Gerald thinks Alice ratted him out so he confesses to his murders.
Alice and Gerald, now in their 70s, go to prison for murders that occurred 40 years ago. The lake Gerald dumped the bodies of Virginia and the two boys was combed over with high-tech equipment but nothing was ever found. Gerald and Alice end up in the same prison but never see each other.