The Devil Amongst the Lawyers: A Ballad Novel (Ballad Novels) by Sharon McCrumb

This book is also about an actual event but the author imagines virtually all the events surrounding the 1920's trial of a woman of the Tennessee mountains who was charged with the murder of her father. The plot deals mainly with the big city reporters - and one lad representing a local paper - who covered the trial. The ways in which they manipulate the facts to fit a preconceived idea of what the public wants and what will induce that public to follow events avidly are really the main story. Reading, one can't help reflecting that nothing has changed since the Spanish American War - often called 'Hearst's War' because the war mongering newspaper editor whipped people into a nationalistic frenzy - to the present day. Readers are ruthlessly manipulated - and to hell with the truth.We still deal with it.