True Crime Stories of the South

Explore the dark side of the South… The South boasts a rich storytelling tradition--and a rich history of criminal behavior. From Texas to the Virginias, each place has different stories to tell. Several involve writers of the first Harper Lee researched true crime in Alabama and Zora Neale Hurston reported on a landmark murder trial in Florida. A serial killer leaves Louisiana to travel the country, a lonely-hearts swindler visits Texas, Arkansas witnesses a surprising spate of unrelated strychnine poisonings, a West Virginia murder is revealed in a dream, and a one-armed conjure-man commits murder-for-hire in North Carolina. Forensic science expands the crimefighters' toolkit in this tour of some of the South's true crime cases. Crime writer Cathy Pickens brings a novelist's eye to the sinister South and its defining--and quirky--crime stories.