CHRIS MCGINLEY In Person With Paul

CHRIS MCGINLEY chats to Paul about Once These Hills It’s 1898. Up on Black Boar Mountain in eastern Kentucky, life is quiet for the small settlement of farmers who work the land around their cabins. But when ten-year old Lydia King unearths an ancient, preserved body on the seep bog, a curse is let loose. At least that’s what some people believe. They might be right. Down in the valley, the Railroad uses convict labor to lay track, hell bent on timbering all of the hillside. Problem is, a trio of violent prisoners feel the work ain’t exactly to their liking. Behind their ring leader Burr Hollis, a predatory, sadistic man whose name inspires fear amongst the hardest of criminals, they take to the hills and leave a wake of their own hell up on Black Boar, as wide and deep as any timber cut. In the years following, Lydia falls in love and marries a mountain boy, someone as skilled and at home in the woods as she. She discovers an intimate part of herself, and experiences both a physical and spiritual awakening that allows her to put the trauma behind her . . . or so she thinks. When Burr Hollis returns for a reckoning with her, she’ll need all of her huntress skills just to stay alive. But she won’t have much of a chance, unless she can reverse the curse of the bog body COAL BLACK ONCE THESE HILLS Mentions & recommendations  Wilma Dykeman, Harriet Arnow, Janice Holt Giles - Hana Fowler, Willa Cather, Wesley Browne, Sheila Kay Adams - My Old True Love.  Produced by Junkyard Dog Crime Time Crime Time FM is the official podcast of Gwyl Crime Cymru Festival 2023 & 2025 CrimeFest 2023 CWA Daggers 2023 & 2024 & National Crime Reading Month & Newcastle Noir 2023 and 2024 2024 Slaughterfest,