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Never Seen the Moon
The Trials of Edith Maxwell
Sharon Hatfield
Cloth978-0-252-03003-1
$21.95
| Pub Date: | 2005 |
| Pages: | 320 pages |
| Dimensions: | 6 x 9.25 in. |
| Illustrations: | 20 Photographs |
The stranger-than-fiction case of Appalachia's "slipper slayer"
Free-spirited young teacher Edith Maxwell returned late one July night in 1935 to her Wise County, Virginia, home and to her conservative and domineering father. Hearing a scuffle, a neighbor arrived to find Trigg Maxwell lying unconscious on the kitchen floor. Within fifteen minutes Maxwell was dead, and the next day Edith and her mother were indicted for his murder. Edith claimed her father had tried to whip her for staying out late. It was said that she retaliated by striking back with a high-heeled shoe, thus earning herself the sobriquet "slipper slayer."
Never Seen the Moon carefully yet lucidly recreates a young woman's wild ride through the American legal system. Immediately granted celebrity status by the powerful Hearst press, Maxwell was also championed as a martyr by advocates of women's causes. The Washington Post, Time, Newsweek, the New Yorker, and even detective magazines picked up her story. Ernie Pyle, James Thurber, and Walter Winchell wrote about the case. Warner Brothers created a screen version, and Eleanor Roosevelt helped secure her early release from prison.
Sharon Hatfield's brilliant telling of this true-crime story transforms a dusty piece of history into a vibrant thriller. Her discussions of yellow journalism, the inequities of the jury system, class and gender tensions in a developing region, and a woman's right to defend herself from family violence all combine to illuminate the era's social history, and remain chillingly relevant to debates today.
"A tight narrative that does justice to all the facets of a complex story."--Journal of Southern History
"Dusts off this true crime that drew national attention and raises to new heights the question of just how much abuse women have to take before being justified in striking back."--News Sentinel (Knoxville, TN)
"Sharon Hatfield's Never Seen the Moon is a real page-turner of a book--I literally couldn't put it down. Yet this whodunit of the first order also features impeccable research as well as clear and colorful writing. I believe it is the best book ever to come out of our corner of southwest Virginia--the most readable, the most comprehensive. Serious issues are dealt with here (women's rights, or the lack of them; the stereotypical images of Appalachia which appeared in the press; social, religious, and economic conditions in the coalfields; the legal system) but the human drama and mystery of the Edith Maxwell case makes this book read like a novel."--Lee Smith, whose novels include Fair and Tender Ladies and The Devil's Dream
A native of Appalachian Virginia, Sharon Hatfield was an award-winning newspaper reporter in Wise County, Virginia, covering the justice system in the same courtroom where Edith Maxwell was tried for murder. She currently teaches writing at Hocking College in Ohio, and recently co-edited An American Vein: Critical Readings in Appalachian Literature.
Awards:
Winner of the Thomas and Lillie D. Chaffin Celebration of Appalachian Writing Award (2006) and the W. D. Weatherford Award for Non-fiction in Appalachian Studies (2005).
Links:
Preview this book
Subjects:
Appalachian Studies / Biography & Personal Papers / Women's Studies / Communications & Journalism / History, Am.: 20th C.
