Kentucky Books

Mark Putman, sworn to protect and serve. He did so but he is not above the law, Man's or God's. He became a victim out of the heat of passion, or maybe rage. That depends on how one looks at it. I really liked the book, and I'm trying to get a copy for myself to have at my home. I think there are a lot of people who haven't heard of the book, but would read it and find it a fine book to read twice, maybe more.

This book differs from many of the true crime novels by the author writing a story in which you almost feel sorrier for the killer and his family than that of the victim. Also the setting differs from many of the others in this genre. The setting is in the Appalachian Mountains in the county seat of Pike County - Pikesville, Kentucky. Though the story isn't fast-paced, it does not drag either. Although, I've read more interesting stories; the names Ann Rule and Aphrodite Jones come to mind; this is a novel that you want to continue reading to find out what happens. As another reviewer says, it would be nice to find out what has happened to Mark, Kathy, and Danielle Putnam. If you like a book where the killer is not a sleezebucket with many problems, has a conscience and could easily be someone you know and trust, this book should be one you should look into.

i would like to say that , as often as i read true crime stories, this is the first defendant that i have ever actully felt sorry for and i would like to know how he is doing. i feel that the author did a wonderful job of putting all of us in his PLACE and i wonder how he is doing in custody and how his family is doing. i would like the author to respond if he can. i have never felt sorrier for anyone.

I like to read true crime books, and this one was very good. This book made me feel very sorry for the criminal and his family. After reading this book, I wanted to know so much more about Mark Putnam and his family. I could not find anything on the internet relating to the crime. Oh well, I am interested in reading another book by Joe Sharkey now. If anyone finds a website that has info on this subject, please email me.

Bert is still trying to get back on her feet after her divorce. Living next door to her identical twin, Nan, she's currently working as a secretary for a nasty divorce lawyer, Stephanie. The only reason she hasn't quit in search of a better boss is that her Mom and Stephanie's Mom are good friends. But one morning, she goes into work to find that her boss has been shot. Having solved two previous murders (DOUBLE MURDER and DOUBLE EXPOSURE), Bert and Nan try to sift through the many people with grudges against Stephanie to find the killer. Meanwhile, Bert is feeling insecure about her relationship with her boyfriend, homicide detective Hank Goetzmann.

It's great to see the twins back in action. As always, they tackle their latest case with humor. However, this book was a bit slow compared to the others, which is why I'm only giving it four stars. It's enjoyable, but just not quite as good as the first two.

The terrific twin authors give us lively, funny and very real twin protaganists: Nan and Bert. Alternating chapters give each twin's point of view. It is the skill of the authors that makes Nan and Bert each a distinctive character. In this third episode of their adventures, the twins find themselves embroiled in the murder of a tough divorce lawyer who had developed a unique way to make the ex-husband pay dearly for his freedom. I agree with the reader who recommended that you read them all. The first two are available in paperback. Wonderfully entertaining, these authors do it right.

The writing style of these authors is fast paced, humorous and keeps you interested to the last page! Such is the humor that I found myself laughing out loud on several occasions, needless to say my fellow commuters gave me strange looks. After completing this story I instantly went out and purchased their prior books, "Double Exposure" and "Double Murder", which turned out to be great stories as well. A NEW FAN IS BORN, BUY THIS BOOK AND YOU WILL BE ONE TOO!!!!

Some books are right for reading in front of a fire on a rainy day, some for under the covers on a winter night. And some are indulgences, made for the day you played hooky from work because it was the first spring day of the year and you wanted an afternoon on the deck in the sunshine. "Double Cross" is just such a book: it's light, funny, and well-plotted. It features identical twins who are opposites, mothers who are all too believable, a witchy murder victim who deserves what she got, a hint of feminism, and some decent writing--not the least of which is the technique of using a twin to tell the story in alternating voices. I got just what I wanted from this book: amusement, entertainment, and escape.

The Bert and Nan Tatum books are well-written and a joy to read. The sisters, although twins, each have their own strengths and quirks. The chapters in the books alternate between each sister telling the story. Lots of humor along with a good mystery.

Solving the DOUBLE MURDER in the first book has made identical twins Nan and Bert local celebrities. Still, they have no desire to investigate another murder. But then Nan meets Crane Morgan. He's handsome and romantic, and Nan is swept completely off her feet. But Bert has reservations, especially when Louise Eagleston tells her that Crane's identical twin was accused of murder but committed suicide. When Bert goes to hear more from Louise, she finds Louise shot. Now, Bert wants to know more about what's going on, but Nan doesn't want to hear anything bad about Crane or his late brother. Can Bert find the truth while keeping both herself and Nan alive?

This is a fun book. The twins alternating narration is a nice and often funny touch and their personalities get better defined. I figured out the ending before the twins, but by then I was so concerned for them that I had to keep reading. These are great characters that I hope I can keep reading about for years to come.

Sometimes one plus one does't add up to two. When twins write a mystery about twin sleuths and twin killers, it doesn't really compute. My problem with the book is that it alternates from one twin's life and thoughts to the other. It is not confusing, but seems to rely too much on this gimmick and not enough good story telling.

Bert and Nan Tatum are identical twin whose personalities are totally different. Nan is a flirtatious swinging single and Bert is a domesticated divorcee. However, they share a common bond that can never be broken. It is tested by photographer Crane Morgan when Nan falls in love with him at first sight. Bert wishes that she could feel happy for her sibling, but something about Crane leaves her on edge.

Louise Eagleston tells Bert that Crane had an identical twin who killed his girl friend and then committed suicide. Already shaken by that revelation, Bert's bones quiver to the core when she finds Louise's dying body holding a series of photos starring Crane and his brother. Bert strongly feels that there is a connect between the deaths of Louise and the girl friend of Crane's sibling. A bedazzled Nan won't listen to a negative comment about her beloved. It is up to her protective sister to snoop around in order to learn the underlying mystery that engulfed the Morgan twins.

The differing perspective of what is happening from the viewpoints of both twins (whose voice is heard in alternating chapters) makes for a fresh and oftentimes humorous amateur detective cozy. The dawning realization of who and what the villain is turns the novel into a tension building, absorbing story line. This brisk pace leads to character familiarity that makes DOUBLE EXPOSURE a delightful reading experience and showcases the writing talents of Ms. McCafferty and Ms. Herald that should one day reach the pinnacle of their chosen profession.

Harriet Klausner

This book happens to be one of the only studies that Dr. Coleman Hatfield recommended at one of the talks I attended. Dr. Hatfield is the great-grandson of Devil Anse and is quite a history scholar in his own right -- and the author of "THE TALE OF THE DEVIL" the first and only biography of Devil Anse Hatfield.

Waller has meticulously studied the subject matter, and it's worth reading. And American tragedy.

Waller has a done a spectacular job of recreating this now infamous event, seperating fact from myth and rebutting many of the stereotypes that were perpetrated about the feud by the Northern press that glamorized it. As a native of Pike County, Kentucky and a distant relative of many involved in this feud, I found the text most informative. It is also accesible to anyone who is not from Appalachia or who is not versed in its history.

Dr. Waller attempts to get past the "traditional accounts", usually assembled from the newspaper and popular accounts of the time, but falls into one error which confounds the rest of her presentation: she found a great deal of information for the Hatfield family and for the West Virginia side of the river, but not as much for the Kentucky side and she generalized about the second using what she learned from the first. While the book was exceptionally well-researched, some information was overlooked or missed. Professor Waller unfortunately accepts the claim that the Tug Valley was a Confederate stronghold. However, only the West Virginia side of the river was strongly Confederate in its sympathies. The Kentucky side of the river contained a large number of Union veterans (possibly as many as a hundred or more men from this area joined the Federal army), and, in fact, in Pike County the area bordering the river was the most loyal in the entire county (post-war voting records reveal the largest percentages of Republican voters in the two precincts which were part of the Tug Valley). Waller's initial conclusions lead her to dismiss the Civil War connections of the feud. She was apparently unaware of the high degree of Unionism in the region and how it may have contributed to what could have been a continuation of the 1861-1865 warfare on the border, despite the alleged thirteen- and five-year respites. While it is well-known that Hatfield and his kin were Confederate veterans (though there is a justifiable dispute as to whether Devil Anse was actually a member of the Logan Wildcats), and it is also known that many of the McCoys had served in gray with the Hatfields, in the later phases of the feud (aptly identified by Dr. Waller) the participation of several former Union veterans or their sons in the fighting against the Hatfields indicates a significant Civil War connection. The evidence that the feuding was a carryover from the war is substantial and cannot be dismissed.

It has long been assumed that the famous feud between the Hatfields and McCoys in the 1880's was a family affair between two clans of primitive hillbillies. In Feud: Hatfields, McCoys, and Social Change in Appalachia, 1860-1900, Altina Waller argues that this view is nothing less than folklore, and the historical reality of the feud has been all but lost. Her work successfully explodes the myths that have surrounded the feuding Hatfields and McCoys.

In her introduction, Professor Waller discusses the previous interpretations of the feud. The first states that, "the feud and the culture from which it emerged were anachronisms in modern society" and "they represented a primitive way of life which had somehow been preserved in much the same way that prehistoric fossils are preserved." The second school of thought suggests that the feud was a result of the transformation that was occurring in the region due to the "onslaught of industrialization." Waller rejects both of these interpretations because of three aspects of the feud that she has identified as violence, family, and timing. Waller has concluded after much research that "in the 1870s and 1880s, the Tug Valley may have been boisterous and rowdy, but it was far from dangerous" and that "something unusual was happening eithin this particular community which drove a few individuals and families to resort to extreme measures." And Waller discounts the family explanation because " supportersof the Hatfields and of the Mccoys consisted of numerous individuals unrelated to those families; in fact, more than half of each group were unrelated to the feud leaders. More puzzling, there were McCoys on the Hatfield side and Hatfields on the McCoy side." Waller rejects also that the feud was caused by the Civil War. She dates the feud from 1878-1900, and identifies two phases with a five year interim. Waller offers that the feud must be examined internally and also in the light of regional and national trends.

The Tug Valley in the years following the Civil War underwent profound changes. Due to rapid growth in population and the finite agricultural resources available in the Valley, a sort of greedy desperation began to emerge in the character of some inhabitants of the Tug Valley. Also at this time outside interest in the vast resources of the Appalachias was taking the form of big money men and local agents purchasing huge tracts of land in order to exploit the mountains for their coal and timber. Gradually the mountaineer was transformed from an inependent farmer to an impoverished wage laborer. attempting to buck this trend is none other than Devil Anse Hatfield. Through hard work and some crafty legal maneuvers, Anse becomes proprieter of a sizable timber busines. And in the process incurs the wrath of Old Ranel McCoy and Perry Cline. Old Ranel through his own foolishness has not prospered, and Anse has bested Cline in a court action and removed him from his lands, which are then awarded to Anse. This is what Professor Waller has discovered to be the crux of the feud--economic power and control and its resultant societal implications. Anse has climbed the ladder while others have watched, and they are jealous.

These truths were initially lost because of the sensational handling of the feud by the newspapers of the day. Altina Waller has been successful in separating the myths from the reality. She states in conclusion that, "the feudists were struggling with the same historical forces of transformation that had been changing Americal since before the American Revolution." This is the larger picture.

Wendell Berry writes beautifully about regular people living and working in the fictional farming town of Port William. He captures their relationships, their loyalty to each other, the natural world, and their community. If you liked Berry's novel Jayber Crow, you'll appreciate these fine stories. Recommended!

I purchased this book because it was required for a liberal arts class I am taking. I was pleasantly surprised. Although I have four months to read all five stories, I completed them in about 3 weeks. I have read other Wendell Berry stories so I was already familiar with the characters. What I like best about this book is the sense of community, stewardship, devotion and love. The book took me back to a simplier time when farming and community were important and a man's word was as good as gold.

The title story touched me as no story has before or since. A son behaves intimately and unlawfully with his father during the days of his death. With the son we confront stupid laws and unfeeling bureaucracy and, in the end, vital community. The poignancy of the secret burial made me weep. How the son acts out his values with fidelity and grace is a story for all to learn from and be inspired. This is horror made beautiful. Berry's writing here is beyond criticism. Read this book and be renewed.

These stories, especially the title story and "A Jonquil for Mary Penn," are among the finest I've ever read. They are stories of such moral integrity and beauty that I would include them among the best ever written by an American author, alongside the best by Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor, Linda Hogan, and Tony Earley. All are set in the fictional town of Port William, Kentucky, and all confront similar themes: death, honor, community. The story "Fidelity" is the most powerful, the story of a mountain man who, according to the most rigid interpretation of the law, kidnaps his dying father from a hospital. Although Berry is heavy-handed in getting his point across, the beauty and honesty of the story easily carried me through it. A luminous book by one of America's greatest living writers.

I loved this book. His use of imagery was spectacular. He looks at the world of the supernatural in a very tangible way. If you like supernatural thrillers then you will love this one. His writing style seems to be a cross between Frank E. Peretty and Rodger Zelazny. I look forward to being able to read the next novel Mr. McCoy comes out with.

There are forces of evil in the world. Luckily, as portraited in "The King of Ice Cream" there are forces of good that fight day and night to balance the scales. I don't want to describe the book, the reviews above seem to do a fairly good job at that! This book looks at religion, at fear, at innoculous items that could actually be lynch-pin events/foodstuffs that are more then they seem.

Every day we go through life and do normal things, we pass by cigarettes on the ground, we order fast food, we laugh and joke with our friends, we have ice cream. McCoy opens the world up to say "What if what we see isn't what is going on?" Not focusing on typical "Matrix" viewpoints, that the wool has been pulled over our eyes...this book seems to say, if you WANT to look, if you WANT to be a part of it, it is THERE to be a part of. Just be prepared for the WHOLE picture, not the clean, proper, polished viewpoint of religion and a deity.

With tastes of King, Zelazny and other authors this first book from McCoy is a 'clearing of the throat', perhaps rough around the edges, but his voice does shine through and warrants more books to further delve into his imagination.

What if God had a private police force out in the world that battled Demons and rouge Angles? What if one's destiny could be made and determined not only by the past but through visions of the future? What if the treat you are eating could be shaping you into a weapon of demonic or biblical proportions?

All of these questions, and more, are answered in this great first time novel by author Robert Wayne McCoy.

Luke Yeager is part of an age-old police force known as Paladins. They are the police for the church and for God; their duty is to stop any demon or rouge Angle that is causing destruction on Earth. Mill Run, KY is a small college town that just had a new ice cream parlor open. However this parlor is not what it seems and the town populace is getting addicted to a flavor that is loved by all, strawberry.

Unknown to the town, there is a fallen Angel running the ice cream parlor and he is trying to get back into God's favor by doing something that not even God himself would have ever thought possible...give Hell back to Heaven. The Paladins are trying to save the world and stop these unspeakable acts of destruction from happening. Luke wants to be a normal teen-ager but has a secret past that could haunt his future if he is not careful. A past that saw death without an answer and a future that could be dictated by an Angle or an act of Faith.

Any way you look at this, one's faith will be tested to the full ability of Man as a battle is about to be fought. A battle that could reshape the way we see the world or view God. A battle that would take one small town and turn it into a battle ground of biblical proportions. A battle that will see the rise of one man's faith and the fall of another. Luke thought his college classes were tough, wait till he has to battle an Angle.

McCoy's writing is very unique and distinctive but also smacks of recognition of authors such as Gaiman and Zelazny. His chapters within a chapter style of writing are a very interesting way of telling a story. Very reminiscent of another old book that many have held and read in their lives.

As Jay Sherman once said, "buy this book".

When Luke Yeager returns to college in Mill Run, Kentucky, he notices changes have come to the town with two new malls, one of which houses Ice Cream Dreams. Luke senses something evil about the store and the men who run it and does his best to avoid it. People who eat the strawberry ice cream change, subtly at first, until they turn totally to embrace the dark. Luke knows these things because he is a Paladin, an order sworn to fight the demons and fallen angels that prey upon mankind.

Mill Run is the place where the second fall of angels plans to make their stand, seducing most of the town into obeying them. This is a special place where the oldest cathedral in America was built; a site where the leader of the fallen angels rests and waits for his minions to do the necessary work that will awaken him so they can proceed with their plan; if successful they hope to reunite with God in heaven.

From the very beginning readers know that there is something wrong with the town. Places on campus are closed to man and nobody is seen entering or leaving those closed rooms. An orange fog permeates the town but the majority of the townsfolk pay no attention to it. The smell of strawberry permeates the area, a sign of evil that is on its way. Robert Wayne McCoy has written an apocalyptical thriller that is spellbinding, enthralling and memorable, a work that uses archetypes from the Judeo-Christian system, but could just as easily used them from any religion where the forces of good and evil fight the eternal battle.

Harriet Klausner

There are many hundreds of books about the 60s, and they vary in quality from inspired to inane. Generation on Fire is the newest of the oral histories of that time, and it stands out for several reasons.



First, Jeff Kisseloff is a journalist as well as a historian of popular culture, so he has the journalist's ability to elicit the "good stuff"-- the remembered impressions that give an authentic, human voice to the subject of each interview. Kisseloff doesn't philosophize, analyze, or theorize about the times. He simply lets the people who were there tell us what they did.



In addition, his selection of interview subjects is unusual. Rather than letting the big names tell their stories for the umpteenth time, he sought out people who were critically important to the events of the time, but who were somewhat out of the public eye. For example, rather than having Country Joe McDonald tell us about the psychedelic music scene in San Francisco, he talks to Country Joe's lead guitarist, Barry Melton.



His choice of interview subjects is interesting and unusual in its breadth, too. His fifteen subjects include people from the civil rights, women's, anti-war, gay rights, music, black militant, commune, and free press movements. The result is that the book leaves the reader with an good sense of the diversity of the time. That is, there really was no such thing as THE 60s; rather, there was a tumultuous collection of ideas, philosophies, and random notions that together formed the era and gave it whatever significance it has.



What did these various movements and the people in them have in common? That's the real impact of the book. Though these fifteen people were doing very different things in different places-- and though most of them didn't know one another-- every one of them shared an idealistic passion for his or her cause. Even more importantly, each of them was willing to sacrifice, suffer and quite literally risk his or her life for what he or she believed was right.



As the years have passed, the 60s have taken on a kind of nostalgic glow. We now take for granted the rights that these people and many other like them struggled and sacrificed for. Well, as the old saying goes, freedom isn't free.



This book is the story of the people who lived that old saying. I recommend it highly.

This is a good book for hearing some of the folks involved in the turmoil of our nation at the time of Viet Nam, the civil rights movement, and skepticism with government and big business. Although the telling by the individuals interviewed was minimally fleshed out with research by Mr. Kisseloff, the section devoted to the telling of the Kent State shootings really "made" it a book. The necessary use of Allison Krause's story through the eyes of those who knew her best at the time (her boyfriend and her mother) was woven along with some additional information on the National Guard and the government's investigation by Mr. Kisseloff fleshed out a story there. The other individual pieces were good, but the Krause section was best.
It's worth the read and timely in reminding us that Eisenhower's words of warning that the military-industrial complex is this nation's greatest threat. It's chilling how the present reflects that past.

Reading the intimate and riveting recollections of a generation that admittedly I had very lttle connection with was an emotional experience for me. I understand now a great deal more than I did then. The format employed to just let the interviewees recount their stories in their own words without prodding and without interruption made for easy reading. I finished the book in two sessions.

Jeff Kisseloff presents a timely work in which he shows how the voices of protest of the 1960's has had an enduring effect on the way we live today. He highlights the lives of many important voices of the 60's whose commitment to change should still be listened to. Especially fascinating is the portrait of Verandah Porche, a founder of the Liberation News Service, who helped to found a commune in Vermont, still lives there, and continues work as an activist and poet in the same causes that animated her in the 1960's.

Lamar Herrin has long been a sinfully neglected writer. Finally in House of the Deaf, he may at last reach the kind of audience he deserves. Three years earlier, Ben Williamson's daughter, Michelle, was killed randomly, senselessly, in a Basque Separatist (ETA) bombing of a Madrid police kiosk. Michelle was jogging, was an American exchange student. Now, three years later, divorced, unmoored, jobless, her father Ben comes to Madrid--for what? Undertanding? Revenge? Forgiveness?
He leaves his equally unmoored, 21-year-old daughter Annie at home in Lexington, KY, thinking she is safe at college. But Annie does not at first know where or how her father has disappeared.
In Madrid Ben fixes, correctly or not, on a promnent ETA leader, as a man who is likely responsible for his daughter's murder.
As Annie discovers her father's trip to Madrid, and follows him-to find him? save him--Ben follows the ETA leader into Basque country. In prose that's evocative, sinuous, precise and stunning, the two quests begin to converge.
There are no cheap tricks here, no easy answers. Only deepening mysteries of love and revenge, grief and ambiguity, love, guilt, and the nearly overwhelming weight of history--both personal and political.
The ending will remind us why we read brilliant literary fiction.











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This is an extraordinary novel, a quietly harrowing story of a despairing man who struggles to rebuild his broken life by seeking answers. Ben Williamson is 48 years old, financially comfortable, and floundering emotionally. His oldest daughter, Michelle, was the innocent victim of a terrorist bombing in Madrid three years ago. His wife, Gail, is a woman of
relaxed ethics who has blithely burned her bridges and left their marriage behind. Williamson devotes his life to the surviving daughter, Annie, who has always considered herself to be nothing more than a "back up daughter" trapped in Michelle's determined wake. After three years of smothering grief, Ben suddenly and unexpectedly takes action.

In Madrid, Ben eventually locates the place his daughter died. He learns that Basque separatists, known as the ETA, were responsible for the bombing. The Basque and their mountainous regions have never been conquered by any invader. Ben wants answers, and his intuition tells him those answers will be found only in Basque strongholds.

Ben's quest for answers transforms him completely. He learns to stretch life's parameters, trust his intuition while tracking down the man he blames for Michelle's death.

The storyline is exciting and all characters believably human. Through Herrin's skill, Spain becomes a living entity. This book is highly recommended.

One morning in Madrid, Michelle Williamson, a young exchange student, goes out for a run, and never returns. Caught up in a deadly explosion of a Civil Guard Station by Basque Separatists, Michelle is killed; a victim of a senseless attack that really did nothing to advance the Basque cause. Her American family is of course, devastated by the news, with her father Ben Williamson, rattled by grief, never quite accepting the loss.

Three years after her death, and independently wealthy, with his marriage to a successful real estate agent in shambles, Ben decides to go to Madrid, to retrace the last moments of the life of his eldest daughter. Underneath is a simmering hostility, an anger that has been steadily brewing, as he walks through the suburban park where Michelle took her last steps.

But Ben is not the only emotionally damaged member of the Williamson family. His youngest daughter Annie is left behind in Lexington, Kentucky. An unfettered and frustrated twenty-one year old, Annie mourns her older sister, reflecting on her life as second best, calling herself "the backup daughter." While she tries desperately to reconnect with Gail, her distracted mother, she wonders why her father inexplicably took off. Now Michelle's age and enrolled at her sister's university, Annie decides to skip college, preferring to search for her dad in Spain.

Meanwhile, in Madrid, Ben has connected with Paula Ortiz, a sensitive middle-aged woman and an American ex-pat, who awakens long dormant feelings within him, her face so frank and cleansed of expressions, "that Ben feels an entirely different sort of urgency in the pressure of her hand." While Paula tries to work Ben through the tragedy of Michelle's death, Ben begins to obsesses about Armando Ordoki, a Basque Separatist, whom he believes was in some way connected to the bomb in the park.

Author, Lamar Herrin shapes his tale of revenge and redemption around the alternating voices of Ben and Annie, as Ben, ever more obsessed with the politics of ETA and the Basque Fatherland, peruses Ordoki to the Basque hinterland and then on to his hometown. Whilst Ben begins to lose touch and toy with the possibilities of revenge - "all he can tell himself was that he needed a face - one of theirs, a face to make a fair exchange" - Annie trails behind Ben, a self aware and educated young woman, looking for shelter, yearning for the familiar, "the existence of such a place in the very nature of her need."

Herrin effortlessly weaves a story of a freak family tragedy, and spins a dark tale involving a country somewhat mired in internal strife and domestic turmoil. This is Spain where "the ordinariness of things suddenly seemed extraordinary," and where the startling beauty and traditions of the old world, the tensions at the heart of Spanish culture, are juxtaposed with the social mores of the new. The author beautifully evokes time and place, bringing the cosmopolitan world of Madrid to life: "a plaza with a fountain, heavily trafficked sidewalk cafes, a statue of some saint, arcaded walkways emerging into larger plazas that presided over by kings on horseback."

When terrorists kill Michelle a half a world away for reasons that will never make sense, because they haven't lived through it, the Williamson family are left to mourn the loss, a subtraction of one, an abstracted life. In House of the Death, life and death are such fragile, flickering things, such whims of the moment, with Ben, so obsessed with seeking revenge, wondering how he ever came to this place - this place that is so unlike America.

Both Ben and Annie's journey is one of self-knowledge; an important element of the book is also the rediscovery of their love for Michelle, and their love for each other. Their connection together in Spain is fortuitous, but it comes at a pivotal moment in Ben's search for redemption and his efforts to attain some sort of peace. Mike Leonard December 05

Ben Williamson, his wife and two daughters, live a satisfying life in Lexington, Kentucky. The daughters, Michelle and Annie are very different. At twenty-one, Michelle is already treading a career path, a serious and directed young woman who has traveled to Spain to expand her career options. The slightly younger Annie is an idealist, like her father, participating fully in the world around her with joyful laughter. Through their years of sisterly competition, Michelle cruelly tells Annie that she is the backup sister, in case anything ever happens to the golden child, the first daughter. Only in Spain for a month, Michelle becomes an accidental victim of a terrorist bombing by Basque separatists, her young life extinguished in a manner that sunders her family in America, leaving Annie and her parent's, whose marriage cannot survive the tragedy, to come to terms with this cruel legacy.

Almost three years later, Ben Williamson hovers near Annie's campus as if to protect his remaining daughter. After obsessively researching the country where his daughter lost her life, Ben travels to Spain, to the scene of Michelle's death. Ben experiences a series of emotional shifts while in Spain, absorbing all around him, inching around the edges of his unbearable despair and growing rage, in a futile endeavor to make sense of his daughter's death: "As all tourists finally must, he becomes a tourist of himself." While wandering near the scene of the explosion, Ben has the good fortune to meet the divorced Paula Ortiz, a sensible and sensitive woman who is drawn to Williamson, but intuits the depth of his unresolved feelings. After a short time together, Ben disappears and Paula is frantic with unarticulated fears.

Annie is the other half of this story, the lens through which the author discloses Williamson as father and man, the unwitting beneficiary of a devoted daughter with a finely tuned sensitivity to her father's pain and loneliness. Struggling to accept Michelle's loss, the continued rivalry between the sisters, one alive, one dead, still exists in Annie's mind, a stubborn resentment of the favored daughter. Annie thoughtfully assesses where this continued self-indulgence has gotten her. Impulsively arriving in Spain with an increasing sense of urgency, Annie meets Paula with an assurance that astonishes the older woman, for this girl can feel her father's nearness and the dark emotional terrain that consumes him.

The psychological weight of the Williamson's loss is perfectly balanced with the ambiguities of Spanish culture, the small, thoughtful details of everyday life in stark relief to the outbursts of passion, the careful tenderness until the next outburst. The protagonists blindly enter the heart of Basque territory, infiltrated by an angry father who wants another in exchange for his daughter, a landscape of repression, torture and terrorism. In deeply compassionate prose tuned to the subtleties of an exotic culture, the author inserts the conflicted Ben into a world so unlike his own, where historical passions run deep and frequently violent. This extraordinary pilgrimage of one man's broken heart in search of consolation is a moving portrait of loss and personal redemption. Luan Gaines/2005.

"The Klan" tells the story of the author's trek across the South and details the conversations she had with many active in the Klan movement. The first half of the book concentrates on her experiences with some of the minor figures in the movement. Most of these (Grand Dragons- statewide Klan leaders) were small personalities with half-formed ideas about racial inferiority and a half-baked sense of some "Jewish Conspiracy". Many of the subjects are poor and poorly educated. As the book progresses, Sims begins to reap the benefits of making connections within this marginalized culture. She begins to meet with some of the men jockeying for the national leadership of the various Klans (men like Robert Shelton, David Duke, and James Venerable). These types come off as much more eloquent, soft-spoken and professional about their racist views. And they are portrayed in a balanced way, with a genuine interest into their characters as men and leaders. Along the way, Sims picks up anecdotes about the history and significant events associated with the movement.

Using primary sources Sims presents an interesting window into the way these people view our society. There is ample speculation about membership numbers circa 1976 (the year in which much of the book was originally written), but the secrecy of the organization makes it impossible to find the truth.
Although those presented are the most radical examples of this brand of thought, I would venture to guess that a lot of lower and middle class whites in America have engaged in some watered down form of this thinking. I found myself confronting some of the perceptions and stereotypes I carry around with me, both about blacks AND whites.

The story of the Klan(s) is one of infighting, backstabbing and incompetence. But it is also about the very real frustrations, fears, and passions these people bring to the race issue in their everyday lives. It must have been very difficult for the author to remain openminded and hear what they had to say. I think she was able to make a fairly valiant effort.

Patsy Sims book is by far one of the best books I've read on the Klan. This book would come second to "Soliders of God." She covers a wide range of famous (or will be in the history books later on) men who are actually still amoung us! She mainly lets these men speak from the book so that the reader can hear what they really think. She does let some of her personal comments out. I personally do not like that style of writting or news. Report facts not opinions or personal feelings. She fails to mention that Imperial Wizard James Venable gave his position to Ray Larsen in 1993. I.W. Ray Larsen has since taken the National Knights into 23 different Nations! For the above 2 mentioned facts I only gave her 4 stars. Worth Buying? Yes.

"The Klan" tells the story of the author's trek across the South and details the conversations she had with many active in the Klan movement. The first half of the book concentrates on her experiences with some of the minor figures in the movement. Most of these (Grand Dragons- statewide Klan leaders) were small personalities with half-formed ideas about racial inferiority and a half-baked sense of some "Jewish Conspiracy". Many of the subjects are poor and poorly educated. As the book progresses, Sims begins to reap the benefits of making connections within this marginalized culture. She begins to meet with some of the men jockeying for the national leadership of the various Klans (men like Robert Shelton, David Duke, and James Venerable). These types come off as much more eloquent, soft-spoken and professional about their racist views. And they are portrayed in a balanced way, with a genuine interest into their characters as men and leaders. Along the way, Sims picks up anecdotes about the history and significant events associated with the movement.

Using primary sources Sims presents an interesting window into the way these people view our society. There is ample speculation about membership numbers circa 1976 (the year in which much of the book was originally written), but the secrecy of the organization makes it impossible to find the truth.
Although those presented are the most radical examples of this brand of thought, I would venture to guess that a lot of lower and middle class whites in America have engaged in some watered down form of this thinking. I found myself confronting some of the perceptions and stereotypes I carry around with me, both about blacks AND whites.

The story of the Klan(s) is one of infighting, backstabbing and incompetence. But it is also about the very real frustrations, fears, and passions these people bring to the race issue in their everyday lives. It must have been very difficult for the author to remain openminded and hear what they had to say. I think she was able to make a fairly valiant effort.

This has got to be the most comprehensive look at the Klan that I have ever read. Her subjects talk to her as if they aren't afraid to reveal their secrets. It takes a talented author to make a klansman reveal the kind of stuff that is related in this book.

Writers are wonderfully creative beings, but sometimes a story is so intimate that you wonder if it's biographic in nature. Lonesome Road's main character is Ruth Brough, a mother who lives through one of the worst nightmares any mother can face--that of a missing child. Thanks to Martha Bennett Stiles suburb story telling, I can't help thinking that Ruth is real. The reader's experience is too real to be just fiction.

Lonesome Road isn't the run-of-the-mill crime investigation plot. The story isn't about the detective, the criminal, or even the child. We've already read those stories. Instead, Ms. Stiles gives us an almost voyeuristic peek into the mother's heart.

Only Ms. Stile's purposeful, intense, and flowing language kept me going once I knew what was coming. I'm glad I kept going, but I shook my head silently to myself the whole way through. When I was overcome with recognition, I stopped reading--yes, that is exactly what I might do. When I was overcome with reality, I stopped reading--did the author live this, I wondered.

The truth is, that's just storytelling at its best.

Ruth Brough is a blissfully happy, albeit somewhat naive stay-at-home mom who helps her husband on their horse farm. Ms. Stiles paints a serene and picturesque life, shattered by the unthinkable. Despite the event's horror, Ruth's story is one of hopeful coping--if I do this, then Lang will come home... yes, that is exactly how I would get through each day I think.

During the ordeal, we meet a variety of characters. Albert Blount, the black detective assigned to the case, deals with the subtle racism still alive and well in central Kentucky. Ms. Stiles balances his experiences nicely by giving him a sister who's not so fond of whites. It's a tough subject, but the author handles it with sensitivity and honestly. Ruth's friends--a poor mountain girl who leaves home to find a better life and a debutante socialite--provide insight into the community's character. Ruth's husband finds ways to distract himself when he can't share his grief. Through it all, Ruth remains steadfast and determined--If I just...

Perhaps what I appreciate the most about this story is the creative, yet succinct and forthright way the author shares the details of Ruth's struggle. Ms. Stiles never wastes a word and every word is perfectly poignant, just to the degree necessary--never more or less than is needed. Ms. Stiles set the characters and plot quickly. Before you know it, you're totally caught up in events. With each new character, I recognized pieces of myself. I cared about every character.

Be prepared for a few late nights because you won't want to put the book down. You won't be able to put the book down.

I lost 3 nights of sleep, anxious to see whether or not things would turn out right for Rose, Grove, Lang and Joanna. Right, of course, meaning that Lang would come home healthy - a question Rose agonizes over constantly; that Rose would withstand the heavy strain on her self and her family; and that Grove and Joanna would be able to get past their own fear and pain to support Rose in hers.

Ms. Stiles quickly got me involved with the cast of characters - all extremly well drawn, with sympathy and depth. I recognized pieces of myself in nearly every one of the major characters. It became important that the young detective be able to solve his case quickly and successfully, despite the very real handicaps of race and rural setting. And I got a chance to consider how I would hold up after the disappearance of one of my children - something I have carefully not looked at before. The horse country background refuses to stay in the background - becoming an integral part of setting and story.

Anyone who deals with children, parents, horses, neighbors, or strangers will be glad they read this one - even to the point of going to the office groggy with lack of sleep!

Every mother will instantly relate to the terror that grips Ruth Brough (rhymes with rough)when her young son, Lang, disappears without a trace. Your own heart stands still at the need to drain the home pond, at the constant, unceasing fear and pain she and her family must confront on an hourly basis while continuing a daily life. Her veterinarian husband must continue his practice, and their thoroughbred broodmares demand constant attention, a salvation, of sorts, in itself.

Adding to the mix, the detective assigned to the case, Albert Blount, is a highly educated black man working in a region still holding some prejudicial mores. His natural dedication is implemented by the obvious feelings of others that he may not perform as well as is needed to locate a white child.

This reader not only received the adrenalin rush of a mother when a child is in mortal danger, but was exposed to facts of horse breeding and care that would not have been brought to my attention otherwise. No wonder it is an expensive and heart breaking business. Coming from an area of the country that, I believe, is a little more advanced in understanding cultural mixes, I was at times taken aback by views expressed by the characters. Having come from a different region, however, I know that these views, unfortunately, still hold true in many areas of the United States.

Martha Bennett Stiles has written in the first person, interweaving the past with the present which kept me on my toes to discern which was which. I did get off track on occasion but on the whole, found the intermingling of the years to hold my attention quite well. I read consistently for three evenings to reach the summation of the crisis and was not disappointed. I intend to read it again to pick up on the more tangible, educational aspects. After all, I know people who own horses! And I will always be my own childrens' mother and will always hold their safety close to my heart.

This book fully engages the reader in the terror a family experiences when their child is kidnapped. The story is extremely well-told and involving. But there's so much more than the agony of the family members, particularly the mother, although that is so strongly felt. There is also a great deal of humor, surprising as that may seem, and the characters who gather around the family are sharply drawn. We were also very interested in the setting of the book, the Bluegrass area of Kentucky, because of the author's understanding of the class and racial tensions which collide in that pastoral setting. The book which comes from a small publisher has not received the attention we think it merits. Well, now you know that we think this is a really good book you shouldn't miss.