Overview

​Trailed is a beautifully written account of a great American tragedy--the unsolved murders of an undetermined number of young women, all by the same serial killer, who got away. The truth is still buried. I couldn't put it down.--John Grisham, #1 New York Times bestselling authorA riveting deep dive into the unsolved murder of two free-spirited young women in the wilderness, a journalist's obsession--and a new theory of who might have done it In May 1996, Julie Williams and Lollie Winans were brutally murdered while backpacking in Virginia's Shenandoah National Park, adjacent to the world-famous Appalachian Trail. The young women were skilled backcountry leaders and they had met--and fallen in love--the previous summer, while working at a world-renowned outdoor program for women. But despite an extensive joint investigation by the FBI, the Virginia police, and National Park Service experts, the case remained unsolved for years. In early 2002 and in response to mounting political pressure, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft announced that he would be seeking the death penalty against Darrell David Rice--already in prison for assaulting another woman--in the first capital case tried under new, post-9/11 federal hate crime legislation. But two years later, the Department of Justice quietly suspended its case against Rice, and the investigation has since grown cold. Did prosecutors have the right person? Journalist Kathryn Miles was a professor at Lollie Winans's wilderness college in Maine when the 2002 indictment was announced. On the 20th anniversary of the murder, she began looking into the lives of these adventurous women--whose loss continued to haunt all who had encountered them--along with the murder investigation and subsequent case against Rice. As she dives deeper into the case, winning the trust of the victims' loved ones as well as investigators and gaining access to key documents, Miles becomes increasingly obsessed with the loss of the generous and free-spirited Lollie and Julie, who were just on the brink of adulthood, and at the same time she discovers evidence of cover-ups, incompetence, and crime-scene sloppiness that seemed part of a larger problem in America's pursuit of justice in national parks. She also becomes convinced of Rice's innocence, and zeroes in on a different likely suspect.Trailed: One Woman's Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders is a riveting, eye-opening, and heartbreaking work, offering a braided narrative about two remarkable women who were murdered doing what they most loved, the forensics of this cold case, and the surprising pervasiveness and long shadows cast by violence against women in the backcountry.

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Reviews

In an outdoor atmosphere where women, BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ individuals are working hard for equal footing, Trailed explores the root of sexism and bigotry in the outdoor community and becomes a rallying cry for moving forward together. --Jennifer Pharr Davis, National Geographic Adventurer of the Year and author of The Pursuit of Endurance Beyond an illumination of the murders of two young queer women, this book is a deeply empathetic inquiry into who has the right to venture into the woods and to do so safely. Miles' book is nothing less than a parsing of the forces that have long stood between women and queer people and their physical freedom. --Emma Copley Eisenberg, author of The Third Rainbow Girl Trailed is a beautiful story about a female journalist seeking clarity and life for two women she never knew, and looking to restore the wilderness as a place of healing and safety for all women in the process. An established backcountry hiker herself, Miles follows a serpentine trail of misogyny and the resilience and joy of women in spite of it. Trailed is also a love story. You will turn pages as fast as you can. --Lacy Crawford, author of Notes on a Silencing A tragic story of young lovers, gone too soon. A #metoo reckoning, long overdue. A study of trauma's ripple effects, extending for decades. Trailed is meticulously investigated, achingly intimate, and doggedly persistent in the pursuit of justice. --Robert Kolker, bestselling author of Hidden Valley Road This is a sleepless night of a book, a toss-and-turn story about a double homicide near America's legendary footpath that wrestles with intimacy, anger, and our ideas of safety. We get the fascinating, uncomfortable opportunity to join an increasingly-obsessed journalist on her quest to puzzle out what happens when a wild and peaceful place is shattered by violence. --Ben Montgomery, author of A Shot in the Moonlight and the New York Times bestselling Grandma Gatewood's Walk

Author Information

Kathryn Miles is the author of five books. Her essays and articles have appeared in publications including Audubon, Best American Essays, Best American Sports Writing, the Boston Globe, the New York Times, Outside, Politico, and Time. A contributing editor at Down East magazine, Miles also serves as a scholar-in-residence for the Maine Humanities Council and as a faculty member in several MFA programs. Her website is https: //www.kathrynmiles.net.

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