Moving Mountains: How One Woman and Her Community Won Justice from Big Coal

Investigative reporter Loeb compassionately chronicles 10 years of grassroots efforts by citizens of southern West Virginia to protect their homes from coal-mining damage. The story centers on the efforts of Patricia Bragg, who in 1998, together with attorney Joe Lovett, filed a lawsuit in federal court against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the West Virginia Division of Environmental Protection for their failure to regulate the waste from mountaintop mining, a practice in which hundreds of feet are sliced off mountaintops and the leftover rubble is dumped into streams and narrow valleys. This case, which resulted in a ruling for a two-year moratorium on mountaintop removal by a judge who had not previously favored environmental causes, is the high point of the book. Though the judge’s ruling was later overturned on appeal, the Bragg case led to some improvements in coal-mining procedures. Unfortunately, Loeb overloads her account with too many stories of other people struggling for fair treatment by the coal company. She’s very effective, however, in pointing out the heartbreaking dilemma of these West Virginians: the industry that threatens their quality of life is also the lifeblood of their economy. Photos not seen by PW . (Aug.)