American fire : love, arson, and life in a vanishing land

Title:

Author:

Hesse, Monica, author.

Personal Author:

Hesse, Monica, author.

ISBN:

9781631490514

Edition:

First edition.

Physical Description:

255 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 25 cm

Contents:

"Charge that line!" -- "The South starts here" -- "Orange in the sky" -- Charlie -- Monomanie incendiaire -- Tonya -- "Like a ghost" -- "Tell us what you know about that" -- Charlie and Tonya -- Schrödinger's evidence -- The eastern shore arsonist hunters -- "I've seen enough ass to know" -- "Like hell was coming up through the ground" -- Tonya and Charlie -- "They're not hunters at all" -- "I didn't light them all" -- "Someday they'll go down together" -- "Everybody has a reason for why they do things in life" -- "I can't tell you something I don't know" -- "Midnight without makeup" -- The broken things -- "Time to wake up" -- Burned -- "We'd done it before" -- "They came out of everywhere" -- "Moral turpitude" -- What happened next -- "It's over"

Abstract:

"The arsons started on a cold November midnight and didn't stop for months. Night after night, the people of Accomack County waited to see which building would burn down next, regarding each other at first with compassion, and later suspicion. Vigilante groups sprang up, patrolling the rural Virginia coast with cameras and camouflage. Volunteer firefighters slept at their stations. The arsonist seemed to target abandoned buildings, but local police were stretched too thin to surveil them all. Accomack was desolate--there were hundreds of abandoned buildings. And by the dozen they were burning. The culprit, and the path that led to these crimes, is a story of twenty-first century America....Though it's hard to believe today, one hundred years ago Accomack was the richest rural county in the nation. Slowly it's been drained of its industry--agriculture--as well as its wealth and population. In an already remote region, limited employment options offer little in the way of opportunity. A mesmerizing and crucial panorama with nationwide implications, American Fire asks what happens when a community gets left behind. Hesse brings to life the Eastern Shore and its inhabitants, battling a punishing economy and increasingly terrified by a string of fires they could not explain. The result evokes the soul of rural America--a land half gutted before the fires even began." -- provided by publisher.

One hundred years ago Accomack was the richest rural county in the nation. Slowly it's been drained of its industry-- agriculture-- as well as its wealth and population. The arsons started on a November night in 2012 and didn't stop for months. The people waited to see which abandoned building would burn down next, regarding each other at first with compassion, and later suspicion. Vigilante groups sprang up; volunteer firefighters slept at their stations. The culprits were galvanized by a surprising love story built on tight budgets and simple pleasures, in a land half gutted before the fires even began.

Subject Term:

Arson -- Virginia -- Accomack County.

Rural crimes -- Virginia -- Accomack County.

Geographic Term:

Accomack County (Va.) -- Economic conditions.

Accomack County (Va.) -- Rural conditions.

Accomack County (Va.) -- Social conditions.

Summary:

Holds:

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Summary

The arsons started on a cold November midnight and didn't stop for months. Night after night, the people of Accomack County waited to see which building would burn down next, regarding each other at first with compassion, and later suspicion. Vigilante groups sprang up, patrolling the rural Virginia coast with cameras and camouflage. Volunteer firefighters slept at their stations. The arsonist seemed to target abandoned buildings, but local police were stretched too thin to surveil them all. Accomack was desolate--there were hundreds of abandoned buildings. And by the dozen they were burning.

The culprit, and the path that led to these crimes, is a story of twenty-first century America. Washington Post reporter Monica Hesse first drove down to the reeling county to cover a hearing for Charlie Smith, a struggling mechanic who upon his capture had promptly pleaded guilty to sixty-seven counts of arson. But as Charlie's confession unspooled, it got deeper and weirder. He wasn't lighting fires alone; his crimes were galvanized by a surprising love story. Over a year of investigating, Hesse uncovered the motives of Charlie and his accomplice, girlfriend Tonya Bundick, a woman of steel-like strength and an inscrutable past. Theirs was a love built on impossibly tight budgets and simple pleasures. They were each other's inspiration and escape...until they weren't.

Though it's hard to believe today, one hundred years ago Accomack was the richest rural county in the nation. Slowly it's been drained of its industry--agriculture--as well as its wealth and population. In an already remote region, limited employment options offer little in the way of opportunity. A mesmerizing and crucial panorama with nationwide implications, American Fire asks what happens when a community gets left behind. Hesse brings to life the Eastern Shore and its inhabitants, battling a punishing economy and increasingly terrified by a string of fires they could not explain. The result evokes the soul of rural America--a land half gutted before the fires even began.

Reviews (1)

Kirkus Review

A captivating narrative about arson, persistent law enforcers, an unlikely romantic relationship, and a courtroom drama.The setting is Accomack County, a lightly populated area of the Eastern Shore "separated from the rest of the state by the Chesapeake Bay and a few hundred years of cultural isolation." Washington Post reporter Hesse (Girl in the Blue Coat, 2016) knew almost nothing about the economically depressed, desolate county when she first visited there in 2013 after hearing about a series of regularly occurring arsons of abandoned buildings. Eventually, the number of similar-seeming arsons would top out at 67. Though there were no reported deaths or serious injuries, the burning buildings were exhausting the lightly staffed volunteer fire departments in the county and consuming the resources of local and state law enforcement agencies. For nearly half a year, police mounted sophisticated stakeouts hoping to catch the arsonist in the act, but they consistently failed to identify a suspect. Even a profiler, who, it turned out, accurately predicted the neighborhood where the arsonist resided, did not see his lead pan out. Then, finally, a stakeout at an unoccupied home paid off. Hesse reveals the culprit early in the booktwo of them, actually, Charlie Smith and Tonya Bundick ("Bonnie and Clyde of the Eastern Shore"), who lived together romantically along with Bundick's sons. Local police knew the culprits personally; Smith had even served as a volunteer firefighter, as did his brother. As Hesse constructs her narrative, the surprises arrive in the manner of the arrest, the motives for the fires, and the outcomes of the multiple trials. Throughout, the author offers a nuanced portrait of a way of life unknown to most who have never resided on or visited the Eastern Shore. A true-crime saga that works in every respect. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.