Most Popular Books by Jean Ritchie

The "singing family" of which Jean Ritchie writes is that of her parents, Balis and Abigail Ritchie, and their fourteen children, all born and reared in Viper, Kentucky, deep in the Cumberland Mountains. Jean, the youngest of the clan, grew up to be a world renowned folksinger. But she was hardly unique in the family. All the Ritchies sang -- when they worked, when they prayed, when they rejoiced, even when tragedy struck. Singing Family of the Cumberlands is both an appealing account of family life and a treasury of American folklore and folksong. In the deceptively simple but picturesque language of rural Kentucky, Jean Ritchie tells of a way of life now nearly vanished and of a gentle, upright people shielded from the outside world by forbidding mountain ranges, preserving the traditions of their forebears. Foremost among those traditions were the British folksongs brought from England by James Ritchie in 1768. Even in a region noted for its wealth of folksongs, the Ritchies' inheritance was exceptional. Forty-two of the family's beloved songs are woven through Jean Ritchie's narrative, complete with words and often musical scores. Each song evokes a memory for Jean -- hoeing corn, stirring off molasses, telling ghost stories, singing a dying baby to its eternal rest. Songs lightened the burden of poverty for the Ritchies and brought them joy and solace. Illustrated by Maurice Sendak, Singing Family of the Cumberlands will delight readers in all walks of life.

Dulcimer experiences, news, memories, snapshots, playing styles, tuning and tablature methods, favourite songs, opinions, advice and information on the Appalachian dulcimer.

Words and music for 16 songs from The Ritchie Family of Kentucky. How to tune and play and recollections of the dulcimer's local history. Illustrations and drawings.

Obsessional sexual desire is the common thread running through the stories in this book - tragic examples of how death can come at the hands of a once-trusted lover.

This is a collection of pictures and and poems about the players in the Hickory Bridge Club---Eldon's Bridge Bums

SOMEWHERE, SOMEONE IS WATCHING, WAITING ... What is it like to suffer the attentions of an obsessive fan, to be haunted by the menace of a stalker? What changes devotion into something far more sinister and how do the stars cope with the pressure?

He was a pillar of the community, serving on local committees, donating prizes to the rugby club, organising charity collections. His patients thought the world of him: he was attentive, kind, never too busy to chat. Yet Dr Harold Frederick Shipman was also the most prolific serial killer the world has ever known, with between 200 and 300 victims. Quietly, for many years, the small, bespectacled GP was making unexpected house calls - and walking out leaving a dead body behind. The murderous career of Dr Shipman only came to an end when police in Hyde, Greater Manchester, were called to investigate a forged will. Overnight, they found themselves embroiled in the biggest murder case in British history. Substantially revised and updated since Shipman's suicide in prison, this is a compelling account of these monstrous crimes and of the man who committed them. The authors have had unparalleled access to friends, colleagues and patients. Their in-depth and authoritative investigation looks at how he killed, how he was able to get away with it for so long, and - most important of all - why.

This book tells the story of what it is like to be near death, or, in some cases, to actually die and be brought back to life. It is a fascinating collection of near-death experiences and brings together some of the most extraordinary first-person stories ever told.

Two sisters. A broken childhood. A heartbreaking journey. The extraordinary true story of surviving the unimaginable ... In 1945, seven-year-old Barbie and her sister Eva were trapped, terrified, in wartorn Germany. With their father missing, and hundreds of miles from their mother, news of the approaching army left them confronted with an impossible choice: to face invasion, or to flee on foot. Eva, aged nineteen, was determined to find her mother. For Barbie, twelve years younger, the journey was to be more perilous but, spurred on by her sister's courage and her desperate desire to be reunited with her mother, she joined Eva on a journey no child should ever have to endure. Over three hundred miles across a country ravaged by a terrible war, they encountered unimaginable hardship, extraordinary courage and overwhelming generosity. Against all the odds, they survived. But neither sister came out of the journey unscathed ...

JEAN RITCHIE'S KENTUCKY MOTHER GOOSE: SONGS AND STORIES FROM MY CHILDHOOD

'I'll always remember that Christmas. It was the day the angel came...' It is Christmas Eve and Lisa faces another Christmas alone. After running away from home as a teenager to live with a man who treated her badly, Lisa has spent years searching for a peace and happiness that seem forever out of her reach. Now, at the age of 35, although she's settled in a job, she has never managed to open herself up to love. For Lisa has a hidden guilt that's been at the centre of her life for as long as she can remember. And on this lonely Christmas Eve, the burden becomes too much to bear. But then something extraordinary happens, and suddenly Lisa realises that perhaps there is hope. And maybe it's time to forgive herself for her mistakes. There are many obstacles to overcome, but with the help of her angel, Lisa can learn to heal the rifts from her past, and find a love that will last...

Jean Ritchie is the best known and most respected singer of traditional ballads in the United States. The youngest daughter of one of the most famous American ballad-singing families, the Ritchie family of Perry County, Kentucky, Jean carries on her family's legacy as a singer of folk songs and traditional ballads. The music found here tells the story of the ""Singing Ritchie Family."" Built upon a foundation of balladry inherited from old-world Scotland, the family's repertoire was certainly eclectic but not haphazard. The Child ballads, lyric folksongs, play party or frolic songs, Old Regular Baptist lined hymns, Native American ballads, "hant" songs, and carols brought together in this collection were assembled by family members who actively sought out fragments of tunes and completed them by adding or embellishing verses and melodies. This new edition has faithfully retained all seventy-seven line scores of the songs and added four new ones, Loving Hannah, Lovin' Henry, Her Mantle So Green, and The Reckless and Rambling Boy. The original headnotes and photographs tell the history of the song as well as how it became a part of the family's life. Chords are indicated for accompainment, and a new audiography and videography have been added to this edition.

This book written by Jean Ritchie contains colour photocopies of Alexander's paintings and portraits.