Distributed by the University of Nebraska Press for Caxton Press When Edmund Creffield and his "Holy Roller" religious cult made headlines in 1903, it was page one news - not just in the Pacific Northwest, but around the nation. Yet few people in the region today have heard Creffield's name or his story. In fact, the descendants of the people who were involved still refuse to discuss those events of a century ago.

Lifelong friends Coco, Nita and Tia are fed up with their bad luck in love. The beautiful and demure Coco has endured years of physical abuse from her boyfriend but can't seem to drum up the courage to leave him. Tia is a single mother and has dated her fair share of slackers and cheaters. Meanwhile the feisty Nita is sick of the club-hopping lifestyle and wants to settle down. They take action and try 'holy-rolling', turning up to church in their Sunday best to try and bag themselves a good man. A powerful combination of spiritual themes and real-life drama.

These are stories that range in time from the 1950s to the present, and cover topics from extremists churches to rape to farming as a dying lifestyle. Some are semi-autobiographical, others are figments of the authors imagination, and some are mere fragments of dreams.

Distributed by the University of Nebraska Press for Caxton Press When Edmund Creffield and his "Holy Roller" religious cult made headlines in 1903, it was page one news - not just in the Pacific Northwest, but around the nation. Yet few people in the region today have heard Creffield's name or his story. In fact, the descendants of the people who were involved still refuse to discuss those events of a century ago.

Rock music today is universal and its popular history is well known. Yet few know how and why it really came about. Taking a fresh look at events long overlooked or misunderstood, this book tells how some of the most disenfranchised people in a free and prosperous nation strove to make themselves heard--and changed the world. Describing the genesis of rock and roll, the author covers everything from its deep roots in the Mississippi Delta, key early figures, like deejay "Daddy-O" Dewey Phillips and gospel star Sister Rosetta Tharpe, and the influence of so-called "holy rollers" of the Pentecostal church who became crucial performers--Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard.

Julie Lyons was working as a crime reporter when she followed a hunch into the South Dallas ghetto. She wasn’t hunting drug dealers, but drug addicts who had been supernaturally healed of their addictions. Was there a church in the most violent part of the city that prayed for addicts and got results? At The Body of Christ Assembly, a rundown church on an out-of-the-way street, Lyons found the story she was looking for. The minister welcomed criminals, prostitutes, and street people–anyone who needed God. He prayed for the sick, the addicted, and the demon-possessed, and people were supernaturally healed. Lyons’s story landed on the front page of the Dallas Times Herald. But she got much more than just a great story, she found an unlikely spiritual home. Though the parishioners at The Body of Christ Assembly are black and Pentecostal, and Lyons is white and from a traditional church background, she embraced their spirituality–that of “the Holy Ghost and fire.” It’s all here in Holy Roller–the stories of people desperate for God’s help. And the actions of a God who doesn’t forget the people who need His power.

Rock music today is universal and its popular history is well known. Yet few know how and why it really came about. Taking a fresh look at events long overlooked or misunderstood, this book tells how some of the most disenfranchised people in a free and prosperous nation strove to make themselves heard--and changed the world. Describing the genesis of rock and roll, the author covers everything from its deep roots in the Mississippi Delta, key early figures, like deejay "Daddy-O" Dewey Phillips and gospel star Sister Rosetta Tharpe, and the influence of so-called "holy rollers" of the Pentecostal church who became crucial performers--Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard.