No Villains, No Heroes

Book excerpt: NO VILLAINS, NO HEROES is a moving historical novel of the 1912 Hillsville Massacre, the most shocking crime in the state of Virginia, and a cautionary tale for our own time about the true meaning of law and justice. No Villains, No Heroes dramatizes a shocking episode in Virginia history. In March 1912 Floyd Allen was convicted of assault in Carroll County, in Virginias Blue Ridge. When he announced, Gentlemen, I aint a-goin, a gun battle erupted in the crowded courtroom between law officers and the Allen clan. Five people were killed; seven wounded. Floyd and his young son Claude were executed a year later. Other Allens served long prison sentences. But who were the villains? Who were the heroes? In this moving historical novel, the narrator, a detective called in to hunt down the fugitives, grapples with these perplexing questions and the true meaning of law and justice. This exciting novel tells the story of a once-famous but now largely forgotten episode in Virginia history, the Hillsville Massacre of March 1912, recalled in vivid detail by Carter Hayne, a private lawman on the scene. His experience is so transforming that it turns him into a crusading lawyer who dedicates his life to advancing criminal justice. It effortlessly recreates an age and place, pre-modern America 100 years ago in the Blue Ridge Mountains, the setting for an event so complex and weighty, even primal, that it is, as Hayne says, just like a Greek tragedy. Kirkpatrick Sale, author of 12 books, including The Fire of His Genius: Robert Fulton and the American Dream.