Home : Book details : Book description

Description of  Ripple: A Long Strange Search for A Killer

For nine years, South Carolina officials struggled to identify 'the boy in the woods,' whose body had been discovered just south of Myrtle Beach in a fishing village called Murrells Inlet. Meanwhile, 1,200 miles away in Kansas City, Missouri, Frank McGonigle's family searched for him at Grateful Dead concerts and in the face of every long-haired hitchhiker they passed. Consumed by guilt for how they d treated him, Frank's eight siblings slowly came to understand that - like Jerry Garcia sang - he's gone and nothin s gonna bring him back. Frank McGonigle was finally found and identified as 'the boy in the woods.' Four years later, the case still unsolved, Jim Cosgrove, a McGonigle family friend and investigative journalist, picked up the trail of Frank's cold case and began uncovering connections to a ruthless local crime boss and blunders by the threadbare sheriff s department. When his research began to stall, a chance meeting with the soft-hearted, straight-talking 'energy reader' Carol Williams provided a metaphysical spark that reignited Jim's resolve. Although his work as a journalist trained him to be skeptical, Cosgrove found himself starting to become a believer when Carol provided details about Frank's murder that turned out to be freakishly accurate. In 2019, Cosgrove returned to Murrells Inlet with one of Frank s brothers to dredge up some old leads and settle Frank's case once and for all... Read more