Robert Nichols moved his family, including his wife who was pregnant with the author of this book, to Sellerstown, North Carolina in 1969. He was a minister, and ran the local church. Pretty much everyone took to the new minister and his family. Unfortunately, there was one man in town who had an elevated level of self importance, and did not like the fact that the new minister did not bend to his will. When Nichols fired his wife from the church office, he decided to act like a petulant child, calling the family in the middle of the night with harassing words. Horry Watts did a lot of bizarre and criminal things, up to and including drive by shootings, really trying to make life as miserable and as dangerous as possible for the family. Another parishioner tried to finish the job that Horry Watts had started when he shot Nichols and his wife for harboring his wife and child who had left him for his poor behavior.

This book has been on my want to read list for a long time. I am glad that I finally got around to reading it, and if you are interested and do not have a copy, it is currently available on Audible Plus. The story itself was a wild ride, and I cannot imagine living through that kind of uncertainty and torment as a child. I will say that this happened in the South and the fact that it involved church people and men in town who thought they were SOMEBODY does not shock me in the least. The author of this book told her story in a way that was moving while also being morbidly entertaining at the same time. If you are a fan of true crime, you would probably like this. (I will say, however, that the author and her experiences do have a lot to do with religion and such, and if that is something you want to steer clear of in this current Christofacist clime in the US, by all means, skip this book. We can all use a slight reprieve from such topics every now and then, because it is becoming mentally exhausting.)