• Pure Land

  • A True Story of Three Lives, Three Cultures and the Search for Heaven on Earth
  • By: Annette McGivney
  • Narrated by: Christine Marshall
  • Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
  • 4.2 out of 5 stars (119 ratings)

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Pure Land  By  cover art

Pure Land

By: Annette McGivney
Narrated by: Christine Marshall
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Publisher's summary

Pure Land is the story of the most brutal murder in the history of the Grand Canyon and how McGivney's quest to investigate the victim's life and death wound up guiding the author through her own life-threatening crisis. On this journey stretching from the southern tip of Japan to the bottom of Grand Canyon, and into the ugliest aspects of human behavior, Pure Land offers proof of the healing power of nature and of the resiliency of the human spirit.

Tomomi Hanamure, a Japanese citizen who loved exploring the rugged wilderness of the American West, was killed on her birthday, May 8, 2006. She was stabbed 29 times as she hiked to Havasu Falls on the Havasupai Indian reservation at the bottom of Grand Canyon. Her killer was an 18-year old Havasupai youth named Randy Redtail Wescogame, who had a history of robbing tourists and was addicted to meth. It was the most brutal murder ever recorded in Grand Canyon's history. Annette McGivney covered the tragedy for Backpacker magazine where she is Southwest Editor and she wrote an award-winning article that received more reader mail than any story in the last decade.

While the assignment ended when the article was published, McGivney could not let go of the story. As a woman who also enjoys wilderness hiking, McGivney felt a bond with Hanamure and embarked on a years-long pursuit to learn more about her. McGivney traveled to Japan and across the American West following the trail Hanamure left in her journals. Yet, McGivney also had a connection to Wescogame, Hanamure's killer, and her reporting unexpectedly triggered long-buried memories about violent abuse McGivney experienced as a child.

Pure Land is a story of this inner and outer journey, how two women in search of their true nature found transcendence in the West's most spectacular landscapes. It is also a tale of how child abuse leads to violence and destroys lives. And it is, ultimately, a story of healing. While chronicling Hanamure's life landed McGivney in the crime scene of her own childhood, it was her connection to Hanamure - a woman she did not know until after Hanamure died - that helped McGivney find a way out of her own horror.

©2017 Annette McGivney (P)2017 Audible, Inc.

What listeners say about Pure Land

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Compelling story about Tomomi, too much personal

The author and reader are great at telling Tomomi's at once heartbreaking and compelling story; she was an amazing young lady.
Unfortunately, the author adds to this book another story- that of her own childhood trauma- and how Tomomi's story led her into treatment of that trauma. This second tale is likely one that needed to be told and others can learn from it, but I felt it took too much away from the main story about Tomomi.

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3 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Wow- this is a powerful, complex story!

The complexity and beauty of this story is riveting and profound. It touches on all the things in life I love: outdoor expeditions into wilderness, dogs, psychology of criminality, cultural history, and in particular learning more about the people who lived on the land that I call home before it become the United States.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Must-hear story let down by awful narration

An incredible multi-strand story that keeps revealing. Timely and poignant, it is let down by the horrible narration and equally horrible Audible edit. Just awful. What a shame.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Moving and Insightful

This is a tremendous piece of journalism and writing. It is a multi-layered, depthful inspection of trauma and healing power of Nature. Trauma on both huge cultural levels and small personal levels.

The book is not depressing, however. It is heartfelt, compassionate and uplifting. It is educational and Insightful as well.

I am deeply impressed with the author's intelligence and heart. I heard an interview with her on the "Once Upon a Crime" podcast last week and immediately purchased the audiobook and devoured all twelve hours over a couple of days.

Thank you, Annette. Your book is a service to humankind.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Compelling stories

The book began with three separate compelling stories and tied them together in a fascinating way. The narrator was annoying in the way she would "sing" the last syllable in a sentence. Definitely worth listening to, especially for those who have experienced trauma.

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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

All backstory, endless detail

I couldn’t take all the backstory and detail. I didn’t care enough about the characters. Christine Marshall’s reading kind of sounded like baby talk, which made it worse. I couldn’t bear listening another 8 hours and abandoned the book.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • JS
  • 06-10-23

I read after visiting supai

I wanted to know more about the area and came across this book. I thought it was very enjoyable. I read some complaints about the author interweaving her own story and I have to agree that in the beginning it wasn’t obvious to me why we were listening to her story instead of the main characters. It does come together in the middle-ish end and I enjoyed all three stories that were revealed. A good book if you love the outdoors and consider yourself a bit of a “searcher.”

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Intense stories

This book consists of three interwoven personal stories: the Japanese girl (Tomami), the boy who killed her, and the author's. During the first part of the book, I, like others, wondered about the inclusion of the author's story as it just didn't seem to fit. By the end of the book, however, she wove it into the narrative quite well, though I do still think some of the earlier entries were superfluous. Overall I think it is an engrossing narrative, one story about a boy neglected by the system and his family, a girl who falls in love with the American West, maybe too much, and an author gripped by the story she covers that won't let her go until she learns some surprising things about herself and her life, all set around the Grand Canyon. The book is well-written and keeps you engrossed in the tapestry she weaves. The narration is good, though having lived and worked at the Grand Canyon, I was frustrated by some of the pronunciation inconsistencies. I do think the interviews at the end didn't do much for the understanding of the story, as it was pretty much already in the main body of the book. Recommended for those interested in true crime, Native American history and issues, and the process of cause and effect in people's lives.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

profoundly moving

I felt everything. I felt empathy, sympathy, fear, sadness, joy, anger and confusion. but most of all I felt gratitude and ah ha. so much makes sense. I needed this book. I believe every American would be well-advised to read this book

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Well told

A well told story of the tragic murder of a Japanese tourist in the Grand Canyon, intertwined with the author's personal journey of discovery and recovery from childhood violence. Compelling, harrowing, beautiful, touching. The reader comes to know the victim as a wonderful, inquisitive, sweet woman who loved America - especially the southwest and Native American culture. You also learn about the perpetrator and his and his people's troubled backgrounds, and the role of the government and NPS in their loss of homeland, identity, property, culture, and so much more. The author's personal story, which was unfolding as she researched the book and which she includes because of the connections she felt to the victim, but also to many other aspects of the story, is also raw and compelling. So much sadness in so many lives, but a book worth reading (or hearing) - maybe more than once.

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