So what’s this book about, anyway?

In August, 1936, Rainey Bethea, a twenty-six year old African American from Virginia, was executed for the crime of rape in Owensboro, Kentucky. Hundreds of reporters and a crowd estimated at 20,000 people descended on the city of Owensboro to witness the execution, due in no small part to the fact that the sheriff in charge at the time was a white woman.

I’ve been fascinated by this story since I first learned about it as a student at Kentucky Wesleyan College in the late 1990s. I’ve also had a lifelong dream to write a novel, and the story of Bethea’s crime, trial, and execution is one that I just couldn’t seem to let go of.

Finally, in the summer of 2017, I spent early morning hours on my patio consuming massive amounts of coffee and typing out a 60,000+ word manuscript in just 30 days. It took me another eighteen months to get the manuscript revised and ready for publication.

The result is Waverly: A Novel. It’s a mixture of fact and imagination, the result of hours of research of the true historical events and a whole lot of “what ifs.” I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Happy reading! 🙂