Book Review of Twilight in Hazard: An Appalachian Reckoning by Alan Maimon

UPDATED: 2/5/2023

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304 pages, published on June 8, 2021 (I received an advanced copy of this book through the publisher on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)

YOU MAY ENJOY THIS BOOK IF YOU LIKE:

Rural America * Non-Fiction * Social Issues

TRAVEL INSPIRATION:

The focus of this work of non-fiction is rural eastern Kentucky, situated alongside the beautiful Appalachian Mountains. This region both remote and isolated from the more well-known parts of the state. In some ways, it is a microcosm of and at the heart of challenges afflicting much of the US in the early decades of the 21st century.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: alan maimon

American journalist Alan Maimon began his career writing for The New York Times in their Berlin office. Upon repatriating to the US, he wanted to be based in a part of the country that would feel a bit foreign to him and found himself as a reporter assigned to rural eastern Kentucky. Starting in late 2000, Maimon lived and worked the eastern Kentucky beat for about five years. His tenure came at the confluence of September 11th upheavals, the continued demise of local newspapers, the battles around the environment and safety of coal mining, and the havoc that prescription drug abuse brought to society.

REVIEW OF twilight in hazard: an appalachian reckoning BY alan maimon

Twilight in Hazard: An Appalachian Reckoning is named after Hazard, Kentucky, one of many small towns in rural Kentucky with unusual names. Sometimes people affiliate this town name with the show Dukes of Hazzard, which is spelled differently.

Much has been made about the urban and rural divide in America, a topic that reached new urgency as pundits, pollsters, and social scientists sought to make sense of the 2016 presidential election. Overnight, books such as J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy became best-sellers. A national narrative was told by reporters from Big City, USA, popping in to visit rural Kentucky and other rural spots, to identify their “otherness”.

While Alan Maimon left Kentucky in early 2006, a full decade before that hoopla, his wife was a local and so he has stayed connected to the area. In this book, he sets out to explain a more in-depth recent history of eastern Kentucky, a tale of labor unions eroding over the decades, of political loyalties that created Democrats on paper but who rarely voted for that party.

In his time driving the back roads, meeting endless personalities, and uncovering in-depth stories on which local journalism thrives, Maimon became attached to the trials and tribulations of the people in eastern Kentucky. He was able to hit at the heart of stereotypes in the area and to highlight how various national news programs over the years have continued to embed a simple, unappealing narrative of residents of this region. Through a lens of compassion and understanding, Maimon tackled some of the significant blights impacting the lives and livelihoods of many residents.

The early aughts led to an explosion of the now-infamous Oxy-Contin problems as specific doctors and pharmaceutical companies knowingly pushed their prescription drugs on individuals who then became addicted. The safety abuses of large coal mines had long been tolerated and swept under the rug, coal workers had lost rights as their unions frayed, and failure to implement even minor, low-cost measures led to significant permanent disability and loss of life of miners. At the same time, what are residents to do when there is a pride in their chosen profession and it is one of the major industries in the area? Behind the politics surrounding coal mining, which have gotten a lot of air play in recent decades, it is an industry that is eroding through market forces and through increased automation. Add to these factors several interesting stories of collusion and corruption and even murder.

A fair read and summary of what goes on in eastern Kentucky might be as simple as that cliched concept where the rich and powerful continue to line their pockets and take advantage of the less fortunate.

Underpinning Maimon’s story is an hour-glass running out the time on his work in the region. As he was writing for the state-wide paper and based in eastern Kentucky, he watched his newspaper industry changing. Decades of mergers and restructuring of newsrooms had decreased the capacity for truly local news, much less high quality investigative journalism. When his time ran out in Kentucky, no one came in behind him. This is a story repeating itself around the country. What other stories are not being investigated or told? What will the lasting impact of that be in a society that aspires to one built on a foundation of justice?

Of course state boundary lines are, ultimately, arbitrary. Eastern Kentucky bleeds in to my home state of Virginia’s far rural southwest, and it lingers, too, into West Virginia. My local paper, The Roanoke Times, covers all of southwestern Virginia and so many of the stories told by Maimon echo what I read about in my own local paper. A former local journalist, Beth Macy, has written several books based on her experience covering the region: Dopesick, about the Oxy-Contin crisis, and Factory Man, about the impact of former furniture-making company towns losing work and closing up (a parallel to the coal industry). These people-centered stories are important to tell, and I hope people will continue to find a way to tell them. I have a much greater appreciation for and understanding of the plight that rural Kentucky is facing and commend Maimon’s ability to tell this important and difficult story in a way that is easy to connect with and does not feel hopeless.