Criminal defense attorney J.R. Cuttler begins his Sunday with thoughts of flying his airplane around the East Texas area and later watching his Dallas Cowboys play the hated Washington Redskins. That thought is shattered in an instant when the local radio station reports the abduction and rapes of a twenty-nine-year-old woman and her twelve-year-old cousin from the local Walmart parking lot. The identity of the victims and the initial allegations as to their assailant would draw Cuttler into a capital murder case that would forever change his life and his practice of law. This small, deep East Texas town located on the Texas-Louisiana border still lives in times we would all like to forget...times most of us have fought to forget. Therefore, when two White women are allegedly abducted, beaten, raped and sodomized by an uppity young Black man, the county digresses into the mindset of Coloreds use back door. After his arrest in another jurisdiction, Lincoln Johnson is beaten beyond recognition by two deputies returning him to the local jail. It is this senseless barbarity that raises Cuttler's ire to the degree that he agrees to represent the accused. The development of pre-trial tactics, the trial, and hypnotic conclusion pits modern scientific methodology and old time trial theatrics.

Criminal defense attorney J.R. Cuttler begins his Sunday with thoughts of flying his airplane around the East Texas area and later watching his Dallas Cowboys play the hated Washington Redskins. That thought is shattered in an instant when the local radio station reports the abduction and rapes of a twenty-nine-year-old woman and her twelve-year-old cousin from the local Walmart parking lot. The identity of the victims and the initial allegations as to their assailant would draw Cuttler into a capital murder case that would forever change his life and his practice of law. This small, deep East Texas town located on the Texas-Louisiana border still lives in times we would all like to forget...times most of us have fought to forget. Therefore, when two White women are allegedly abducted, beaten, raped and sodomized by an uppity young Black man, the county digresses into the mindset of Coloreds use back door. After his arrest in another jurisdiction, Lincoln Johnson is beaten beyond recognition by two deputies returning him to the local jail. It is this senseless barbarity that raises Cuttlers ire to the degree that he agrees to represent the accused. The development of pre-trial tactics, the trial, and hypnotic conclusion pits modern scientific methodology and old time trial theatrics.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "A riveting book."—The Wall Street Journal "Essential reading."—David Brooks, New York Times From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate, a powerful account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America’s white working class Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis—that of white working-class Americans. The decline of this group, a demographic of our country that has been slowly disintegrating over forty years, has been reported on with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck. The Vance family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.’s grandparents were “dirt poor and in love,” and moved north from Kentucky’s Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually their grandchild (the author) would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of their success in achieving generational upward mobility. But as the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out, we learn that this is only the short, superficial version. Vance’s grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister, and, most of all, his mother, struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, and were never able to fully escape the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. Vance piercingly shows how he himself still carries around the demons of their chaotic family history. A deeply moving memoir with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the story of how upward mobility really feels. And it is an urgent and troubling meditation on the loss of the American dream for a large segment of this country.

This illustrated A-Z guide covers more than 700 country music artists, groups, and bands. Articles also cover specific genres within country music as well as instruments used. Written in a lively, engaging style, the entries not only outline the careers of country music's greatest artists, they provide an understanding of the artist's importance or failings, and a feeling for his or her style. Select discographies are provided at the end of each entry, while a bibliography and indexes by instrument, musical style, genre, and song title round out the work. For a full list of entries, a generous selection of sample entries, and more, visit the Country Music: A Biographical Dictionary website.

Hey, you! The one holding the book. Have you ever seen a volume like this? Well, whether you realize it or not, it’s the one you’ve been waiting for. Jeff Foxworthy’s Redneck Dictionary will teach you how to speak this unique Southern dialect fluently. Whether you’re blue-collar or hoity-toity, swimming in cash or betting your bottom dollar, a little bit country or a lot of city slicker, this practical reference to redneck words and turns of phrases will give you hours of laughs. So expand your horizons and learn another language with this fun, instructive, and hilariously illustrated book as your guide. After all, speaking redneck is a heck of a lot easier than speaking French!

Clearly one redneck dictionary was not enough. And it’s no wonder. The South is positively bursting at the seams with colorful words and turns of phrases in this distinct dialect. Now men and women from all across this great land can further fine-tune their fluency and showcase their confidence when speaking to folks who hail from below the Mason-Dixon line. Need a crash course in this truly inspired lingo? Well, Jeff Foxworthy’s Redneck Dictionary II puts the “vern” in “vernacular,” offering up a veritable gumbo of must-be-known selections: infamy (in’fe-mé) adv. and n. another person’s intent to exact physical punishment. “Ever since I stole his girlfriend, Bobby’s had it infamy.” assassin (e-sas’-en) v. to disrespect verbally. “Don’t just stand there assassin me, boy–go clean your room!” honor student (än’-er stu’-dent) prep. and n. to be positioned over, and supported by, a pupil. “Yeah, I knew piano lessons after midnight was weird, but I still didn’t suspect nothin’ till I caught her honor student.” So open your ears and activate your funny bone with this hilarious, practical, and playfully illustrated reference. It’s like having your very own personal dialect coach–one who doesn’t mind getting picked up and read and laughed at and passed along to friends.

Willie Stark's obsession with political power leads to the ultimate corruption of his gubernatorial administration.

The ultimate guide to country music and its greatest artists includes more than six hundred entries profiling all types of contributors, providing biographies of musicians, characterizing styles, and tracking recording careers in all forms of country music.