Murder in the Bayou: Who Killed the Women Known As the Jeff Davis 8? - Hardcover

A deeply reported, and disturbing, true crime story that is as puzzling as it is intriguing. Ethan Brown s Murder in the Bayou raises as many questions as it answers, but never ceases to enrage. This is a book about power: those who wield it, and those who, tragically, fall victim to it. Janet Reitman, contributing editor at Rolling Stone and author of the New York Times Notable Book Inside Scientology"

"Brown's writing is clear and approachable, and his research is meticulous...readers will be shaken by the unpleasant implications of a narrative bearing similarities to the first season of True Detective. Compulsively readable true crime provoking questions about policing, poverty, and the ritualized brutality of the rural South."--Kirkus Reviews

"The depths of the corruption detailed in the book by Brown...will make your head spin for days after you finish reading it."--Uproxx

"[A] page-turning account...filled with vivid characters...startling and haunting."--Gambit Weekly

"Doggedly researched and sensitively observed."--Gothamist

"Damn near hard to put down."--Sarah Weinman, editor of Women Crime Writers and author of Among the Wholesome Children

"Explosive."--The Huffington Post

Investigating what appeared to be a string of unsolved sex-murders that began in 2005, journalist Ethan Brown eventually uncovered a snakepit of small-town corruption in the bayou parish of Jefferson Davis, Louisiana. With its large cast of lost, doomed, and sinister characters, its dense atmosphere of menace and dread, and, at its center, a dogged reporter pursuing a mystery with the fearlessness of a pulp-fiction private eye, Brown s Murder in the Bayouis a stunning work of real-life Southern noir. --HaroldSchechter, author of The Serial Killer Files"

"Mesmerizing......a snarled web of power dynamics and deep-rooted corruption...symptomatic of a kind of system-wide brokenness that applies all over the country. ...Brown is able to show each individual victim as a real person, who is mourned and who couldn't be silenced as easily as their murderers seemed to think. "--Rolling Stone.com

"Sweeping, rigorously reported...the story has all the elements of a sordid Southern Gothic."--The New Orleans Advocate

Ethan Brown is an investigative journalist, private investigator, and author of three previous books, Queens Reigns Supreme, Snitch, and Shake the Devil Off, which was named one of the Best Books of 2009 by The Washington Post. He has written for New York magazine, The New York Observer, Wired, Vibe, The Independent, GQ, Mother Jones, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Details, and The Village Voice. He has appeared on NPR, WNYC, Court TV, MSNBC, Hot 97, and BET to discuss drug policy, street crime, the music business, life in Louisiana, and other issues. He lives in New Orleans.