OMG, so NPR has some of the BEST book recommendations. And this one was no exception. Generally speaking, this book is about the murder of two women who were hitchhiking to a music festival in West Virginia in 1980. It's broad theme is about restless women and how society handles them. As a restless woman myself, how could I possibly resist.
The two women: Vicki Durian and Nancy Santomero (who was from Long Island, NY - yet another connection), were hitchhiking from Arizona to West Virginia in 1980 for the Rainbow Gathering, a hippie-type peace and music festival that was being held in the woods and mountains in West Virginia (I had no desire to go W.V. before this book, but now I totally want to go!). Their bodies were found in an isolated clearing in Pocahontas County, near the festival. The women had been shot, but there were no signs of other assault or sexual assault.
Rumors flew around. Everyone had a theory about who did it but generally, everyone seemed to agree that the people that committed these acts were locals, based upon where the bodies were located. One local farmer in particular, Jacob Beard, was arrested and tried because he was a mean drunk in particular. He was later acquitted when a notorious serial killer confessed to the killings (it was actually the same guy that shot Larry Flynt of Hustler fame!). Because he was already on death row, there was never any trial for him on the Rainbow murders.
I loved this book. Eisenberg was as close as you can get to being a native without actually being a native having educated young women in the area on and off for years. This gave her a level of access generally reserved for insiders. She takes on things like the "missing white girl" syndrome and the scary hick myth popularized by movies and books like Deliverance. I loved learning about Eisenberg's own story about working in West Virginia as well and she managed to weave that into the narrative of the two murdered women seamlessly. She weaves the narrative of how women want to travel to learn about themselves into the true crime story of two women who sadly lost their own lives.
So good. Go get it NOW!
The two women: Vicki Durian and Nancy Santomero (who was from Long Island, NY - yet another connection), were hitchhiking from Arizona to West Virginia in 1980 for the Rainbow Gathering, a hippie-type peace and music festival that was being held in the woods and mountains in West Virginia (I had no desire to go W.V. before this book, but now I totally want to go!). Their bodies were found in an isolated clearing in Pocahontas County, near the festival. The women had been shot, but there were no signs of other assault or sexual assault.
Rumors flew around. Everyone had a theory about who did it but generally, everyone seemed to agree that the people that committed these acts were locals, based upon where the bodies were located. One local farmer in particular, Jacob Beard, was arrested and tried because he was a mean drunk in particular. He was later acquitted when a notorious serial killer confessed to the killings (it was actually the same guy that shot Larry Flynt of Hustler fame!). Because he was already on death row, there was never any trial for him on the Rainbow murders.
I loved this book. Eisenberg was as close as you can get to being a native without actually being a native having educated young women in the area on and off for years. This gave her a level of access generally reserved for insiders. She takes on things like the "missing white girl" syndrome and the scary hick myth popularized by movies and books like Deliverance. I loved learning about Eisenberg's own story about working in West Virginia as well and she managed to weave that into the narrative of the two murdered women seamlessly. She weaves the narrative of how women want to travel to learn about themselves into the true crime story of two women who sadly lost their own lives.
So good. Go get it NOW!
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