Strokes This Is It...the First Biography Book

Told with the kind of detail, wit, and insight that only comes from years of thorough research and familiarity, Swaggart is an epic tale. The scenes jump off the page like a movie reel in your head. Anyone who lived through these chronicled years is familiar with the rise and fall of the seamy, glittery era of TV evangelists, but most of the backstory is even more garish and surprising than ever depicted in the news. Seaman has captured the feel of tent revivals, sexual innuendo, swampy backwoods and convoluted family relations that tie together cousins Jimmy Swaggart, Mickey Gilley, and Jerry Lee Lewis.

Disclaimer: I knew Ann when we were at grad school together at USC, and this manuscript started out as Three Balls of Fire, about all three of those famous cousins. We all knew 10 years before this got published and won awards that she was telling a story for the ages. As a writer, she has the chops and the guts (oh, the stories she can tell!) to pull it off with aplomb. Hats off.