Book cover of American Murderer: The Parasite that Haunted the South

Book description

Included on NPR's 2022 "Books We Love" List
Finalist, 2023 YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction 
ALSC Notable Children's Book

What made workers in the American South so tired and feeble during the 19th and early 20th centuries? This exciting medical mystery uncovers the secrets of the parasite hookworm, commonly…

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Why read it?

1 author picked American Murderer as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

I was hooked (pun intended) after reading only a few pages of this book! It tells the story of the hookworm, a parasite that caused thousands of Americans living in the South to become deathly ill in the late 1800s, and the efforts of scientists to educate those individuals in order to prevent even more from becoming sick.

The photographs of real people infected with hookworms allowed me to connect even deeper to the story. 

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