Andrews – Longtime Cherokee Scout columnist and Andrews Valley historian Kandy Barnard held a book signing on May 3 at the Andrews Chamber of Commerce, with more than 125 people on hand.
The author’s family, mainly her cousins, provided many of the refreshments
according to Barnard’s daughter, Alaina Trull, events coordinator for the chamber.
“Her granddaughters, Electa and Ethne [Ledford], both brought specially handmade desserts,” making cupcakes and cookies respectively, Trull added. “It’s for their grandmother’s special day.”
Barnard, who was barely able to look up from the long lines awaiting her signature, said her book – which chronicles much of her family’s life and memories in the Andrews area, Cherokee County and Valleytown –stemmed from growing up with a close extended family of eleven cousins.
“In the evenings, our parents would sit around and talk about the past and I was mesmerized by those stories,” she said. “Like the history I write for Andrews, I wanted to write it down before these stories were lost.”
Barnard credits her mother as the inspiration for all of her writing, saying, “My mother was my inspiration from a young age, as she wrote down family stories and poetry as well.”
The collection of short stories is titled The Clan and the Kinsmen: In-Laws and Outlaws, which took Barnard two years to put together for publication.
“It took the better part of two years for me to get all my stories laid out and the photographs together to include in the book,” she said.
“What I want most is for readers to gain from the book is exactly what I say on the back of the book: ‘It is my hope to capture a few of the mountain tales, for all of those who remember and for those who can’t even imagine.’”
Barnard added that, “Each character is a priceless part of memories too special not to portray. They are the mountaineers, moonshiners, revenuers, preachers and teachers: they are the in-laws and the outlaws.”
The stories are mainly drawn from Barnard’s “own family’s branches, including the Birchfields and their experiences for generations in this area,” according to her daughter.
Barnard is recognized as an artist, poet and local real estate agent and is proud to see her rogue’s gallery of characters immortalized in these “tales of hard times, crimes of passion and tragedy and side-splitting humor,” which “all make up the unforgettable past of these mountains.”
Details: Visit amazon.com/Clan-Kinsmen-LAWS-OUTLAWS.