Synopses & Reviews
In 1935, when Erma Morton, a beautiful young woman with a teaching degree, is charged with the murder of her father in a remote Virginia mountain community, the case becomes a cause célèbre for the national press.
Eager for a case to replace the Lindbergh trial in the publics imagination, the journalists descend on the mountain county intent on infusing their stories with quaint local color: horse-drawn buggies, rundown shacks, children in threadbare clothes. They need tales of rural poverty to give their Depression-era readers people whom they can feel superior to. The untruth of these cultural stereotypes did not deter the big-city reporters, but a local journalist, Carl Jennings, fresh out of college and covering his first major story, reports what he sees: an ordinary town and a defendant who is probably guilty.
This journey to a distant time and place summons up ghosts from the reporters pasts: Henry Jernigans sojourn in Japan that ended in tragedy, Shade Bakers hardscrabble childhood on the Iowa prairie, and Rose Hanelons brittle sophistication, a shield for her hopeless love affair. While they spin their manufactured tales of squalor, Carl tries to discover the truth in the Morton trial with the help of his young cousin Nora, who has the Sight. But who will believe a local cub reporter whose stories contradict the nations star journalists? For the reader, the novel resonates with the present: an economic depression, a deadly flu epidemic, a world contending with the rise of political fanatics, and a media culture determined to turn news stories into soap operas for the diversion of the masses.
A stunning return to the lands, ballads, and characters upon which she made her name, The Devil Amongst the Lawyers is a testament to Sharyn McCrumbs lyrical and evocative writing.
Review
Praise for The Devil Amongst the Lawyers:
“The story begins with a train ride, a magic carpet that carries us back to the year 1935 and into the heart of a famous murder trial. As we head for the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, we get to know the characters, those journalists and photographers and sensation-seekers who always turn up for a good spectacle.
“Sharyn McCrumb re-creates this time and place with such precision, the reader forgets that seventy-five years have passed since that faraway event in that isolated place where the outer world clashes with superstition and folklore. This is storytelling as those Celtic bards meant it to be: lyrical, haunting, and truly unforgettable.” --Cathie Pelletier, author of The Funeral Makers and Running the Bulls
“Wow! Sharyn McCrumb is not just a writer---in fact, shes a conjurer, a genius, a wordsmith, an entertainer, a wit, a scholar, a wise woman, and a storyteller of the first rank. The Devil Amongst the Lawyers is flat-out brilliant and transcendent, a book that gets everything exactly right. Simply put, novels dont come any better than this.” --Martin Clark, author of The Legal Limit and The Many Aspects of Mobile Home Living
“The Devil Amongst the Lawyers is a superb novel that, once started, is so well written and so expertly researched that readers will find it impossible to put down. It is also a scathing indictment of how Appalachia has been, and continues to be, stereotyped by a supposedly objective media. Bravo!” --Ron Rash, author of Serena
More Praise for Sharyn McCrumb:
“There are few writers today who are able to blend past and present, tradition and law, legends and headlines in a wholly credible fashion-- Tony Hillerman springs inevitably to mind. Sharyn McCrumb is another; her widely acclaimed Ballad Series is one of the finest being written today.” --Bookpage
“McCrumb provides fresh evidence that there is no one quite like her among present-day writers. No one better, either.” --San Diego Union-Tribune
“Ms. McCrumb writes with quiet fire and maybe a little mountain magic…She plucks the mysteries from peoples lives and works these dark narrative threads into Appalachian legends older than the hills. Like every true storyteller, she has the Sight.” --The New York Times Book Review
Review
There are few writers today who are able to blend past and present, tradition and law, legends and headlines in a wholly credible fashion-- Tony Hillerman springs inevitably to mind. Sharyn McCrumb is another; her widely acclaimed Ballad Series is one of the finest being written today.” Bookpage
McCrumb provides fresh evidence that there is no one quite like her among present-day writers. No one better, either.”-San Diego Union-Tribune
Ms. McCrumb writes with quiet fire and maybe a little mountain magic
She plucks the mysteries from peoples lives and works these dark narrative threads into Appalachian legends older than the hills. Like every true storyteller, she has the Sight.” -The New York Times Book Review
Review
“There are few writers today who are able to blend past and present, tradition and law, legends and headlines in a wholly credible fashion-- Tony Hillerman springs inevitably to mind. Sharyn McCrumb is another; her widely acclaimed Ballad Series is one of the finest being written today.” –Bookpage
“McCrumb provides fresh evidence that there is no one quite like her among present-day writers. No one better, either.”-San Diego Union-Tribune
“Ms. McCrumb writes with quiet fire and maybe a little mountain magic…She plucks the mysteries from peoples lives and works these dark narrative threads into Appalachian legends older than the hills. Like every true storyteller, she has the Sight.” -The New York Times Book Review
Synopsis
“Ms. McCrumb writes with quiet fire and maybe a little mountain magic. . . . She plucks the mysteries from peoples lives and works these dark narrative threads into Appalachian legends older than the hills. Like every true storyteller, she has the Sight.”—The New York Times Book Review
In 1935, a beautiful young schoolteacher is accused of murdering her coal-miner father in
a Virginia mountain community.
National journalists descend on Wise County, intent upon exonerating the defendant, and on stereotyping the mountain community to satisfy their Depression-era readers.
But local cub reporter Carl Jennings writes what he sees: an ordinary town and a defendant who is probably guilty.
The novel resonates with the present: an economic depression; a deadly Japanese earthquake; the rise of political fanatics; and a media culture turning news stories into soap operas for the diversion of the masses.
The Devil Amongst the Lawyers is a literary tour de force, examining social issues that go well beyond the fate of one defendant. It is a testament to Sharyn McCrumbs lyrical and poetic writing about the mountain South.
About the Author
Sharyn McCrumb is the author of The Ballad of Frankie Silver, She Walks These Hills, and many other award-winning novels. Her books have been named Notable Books of the Year by The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. She was named a “Virginia Woman of History” for achievement in literature in 2008. She lives and writes in the Virginia Blue Ridge, less than a hundred miles from where her family settled in 1790 in the Smoky Mountains that divide North Carolina and Tennessee.
Reading Group Guide
1. In this novel, national reporters stereotype the rural mountain community. In what ways do the media or people from other regions misunderstand your hometown or your culture?
2. The Devil Amongst the Lawyers is set in 1935. How do the issues of that time compare with today's problems in health crises; national disasters; international relations; the economy, etc.?
3. How does the prologue (about the hanging of the elephant) relate to the Erma Morton trial?
4. Reread the story of Urashima Taro, told in Chapter Five of the novel. Does this folk tale remind you of similar stories in the folklore of other cultures? Why do you suppose so many cultures independently developed some form of this story?
5. Carl Jennings, Harley Morton, and Shade Baker are all young men with rural origins. How are they alike and in what ways are they different?
6. Henry Jernigan is condescending and prejudiced against the Appalachian culture. He is prejudiced in favor of the Japanese. Discuss this disparity.
7. Nora Bonesteel is a young girl coming to terms with the Sight. Have you or anyone you know had experiences similar to hers?
8. The chapter headings in The Devil Amongst the Lawyers are taken from Oku No Hosomichi, a 17th century Japanese poem by Matsuo Basho. (The title in English is: A Narrow Road to a Far Province.") How does the journey of Basho through the mountains of Japan compare with Henry's journey in southwest Virginia?
9. The year 1935 came amidst the Great Depression. Would you rather have lived in that era in a large city or a rural area? Why?
10. Author Sharyn McCrumb has said "Cities are judged by their richest inhabitants and rural areas by their poorest." Is this true? What evidence can you show to support or refute this statement?