Appalachian Murders and Mysteries: True Stories from West Virginia, Kentucky and Southern Ohio

by James M. Gifford (Editor), Edwina Pendarvis (Editor)

"Appalachian Murders & Mysteries: True Stories from West Virginia, Kentucky, and Southern Ohio" features 23 stories by 17 authors compiled and edited by James M. Gifford and Edwina D. Pendarvis. The tragic events described in this book could have happened anywhere, but they happened in central Appalachia. They are a part of our history. Together, these stories create a literary “mourning quilt,” commemorating the innocent and the guilty and piecing together significant remnants of 200 years of life in eastern Kentucky, southern Ohio, and West Virginia.

411 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2016

Reviews

[Donna Meredith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Appalachian Murders & Mysteries adds to our understanding of the crime of murder, providing historical perspective. Fortunately for all of us, murder is rare—and that rarity contributes to our interest in it, and as Pendarvis points out in the “Afterword,” the murder rate in the Appalachian region covered in this volume is even lower than the national average.
The authors try to lay out the reasons behind each of these criminal acts, but this collection leaves us pondering that unanswerable question: how could anyone deliberately commit such an irrevocable act against a fellow human?
This thoughtful collection provides a thoroughly researched history of murders in West Virginia, Kentucky, and Southern Ohio, rather than a blood-drenched rendition aimed at inducing visceral reactions. The 17 authors of the 23 stories have varied backgrounds. They include scholars, journalists, a state representative, teacher, historians, a judge, an archivist, a publisher, and an administrative assistant.
Accounts are presented in chronological order, beginning with the murder of a black slave child by her owners in 1809 and ending with the murder of a 16-year-old girl viciously stabbed by her best friends in 2012.

[Rhanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable -- if a bit uneven -- collection of true-crime tales from Appalachia.