Today’s post is on The Third Rainbow Girl: The Long Life of
a Double Murder in Appalachia by Emma Copley Eisenberg. It is 318 pages long
and is published by Hachette Books. The cover is a picture of a dirt road
curving into the sun. There is some mild foul language, discussion of sex and
sexuality, and descriptions of violence in this book. There Be Spoilers Ahead.
From the dust jacket- A stunningly written investigation
of the murder of two young women--showing how a violent crime casts a shadow
over an entire community.
In the early evening of June 25, 1980 in Pocahontas County, West Virginia, two middle-class outsiders named Vicki Durian, 26, and Nancy Santomero, 19, were murdered in an isolated clearing. They were hitchhiking to a festival known as the Rainbow Gathering but never arrived. For thirteen years, no one was prosecuted for the "Rainbow Murders," though deep suspicion was cast on a succession of local residents in the community, depicted as poor, dangerous, and backward. In 1993, a local farmer was convicted, only to be released when a known serial killer and diagnosed schizophrenic named Joseph Paul Franklin claimed responsibility. With the passage of time, as the truth seemed to slip away, the investigation itself caused its own traumas-turning neighbor against neighbor and confirming a fear of the violence outsiders have done to this region for centuries.
Emma Copley Eisenberg spent years living in Pocahontas and re-investigating these brutal acts. Using the past and the present, she shows how this mysterious act of violence has loomed over all those affected for generations, shaping their fears, fates, and the stories they tell about themselves. In The Third Rainbow Girl, Eisenberg follows the threads of this crime through the complex history of Appalachia, forming a searing and wide-ranging portrait of America-its divisions of gender and class, and of its violence.
In the early evening of June 25, 1980 in Pocahontas County, West Virginia, two middle-class outsiders named Vicki Durian, 26, and Nancy Santomero, 19, were murdered in an isolated clearing. They were hitchhiking to a festival known as the Rainbow Gathering but never arrived. For thirteen years, no one was prosecuted for the "Rainbow Murders," though deep suspicion was cast on a succession of local residents in the community, depicted as poor, dangerous, and backward. In 1993, a local farmer was convicted, only to be released when a known serial killer and diagnosed schizophrenic named Joseph Paul Franklin claimed responsibility. With the passage of time, as the truth seemed to slip away, the investigation itself caused its own traumas-turning neighbor against neighbor and confirming a fear of the violence outsiders have done to this region for centuries.
Emma Copley Eisenberg spent years living in Pocahontas and re-investigating these brutal acts. Using the past and the present, she shows how this mysterious act of violence has loomed over all those affected for generations, shaping their fears, fates, and the stories they tell about themselves. In The Third Rainbow Girl, Eisenberg follows the threads of this crime through the complex history of Appalachia, forming a searing and wide-ranging portrait of America-its divisions of gender and class, and of its violence.
Review- A meandering narrative about both the murders and
the author’s life. Over the course of the book we get a rough history of the
state of West Virginia, the people who live there, the Rainbow Gatherings, the
young women who were murdered, the men who were charged with the crime, the man
who probably did it and the author’s life. It is all too much, I wanted the
true crime and that is all. I skimmed the parts about the author’s life to get
back to the murder and the investigation. The murders themselves were very
mysterious and changed the community around them but other than being told that
we, the reader, was not shown how that played out into the community at large.
We do not learn about the community in response to the murders only that
something happened. The man who probably did the crimes until almost the end of
the book. If you know anything about the murders than you may want to read this
book but if you are looking for a focused true crime book then you skip this
one.
I give this book a Three out of Five stars. I get nothing
for my review and I borrowed this book from my local library.
No comments:
Post a Comment