Janice Holt Giles

Janice Holt Giles was born on March 28, 1909, in Altus, Arkansas, at the home of her maternal grandparents. Soon her mother, Lucy Elizabeth McGraw Holt, joined her father, John Albert Holt, who was teaching Choctaw children in what is now Oklahoma. In 1917, the Holt's moved to Fort Smith, Arkansas, where Janice graduated from high school and, in 1927, married Otto Moore. The next year a daughter, Libby, was born. The Moore's were divorced in 1939, and Janice and Libby moved to Frankfort and then Louisville, Kentucky, where Giles continued to work as she had in Arkansas as a secretary to church congregations, associations and seminaries.

In 1943, Janice met Henry Giles when he boarded her bus dressed in his Army uniform. They shared a seat on a trip that took him to a Texas Army base and her back home to Arkansas and began a spirited correspondence. The next year Libby married a G. I., named Nash Hancock, and in 1945 Janice and Henry Giles were wed. In 1949 the Giles' moved to a forty acre farm on the Green River in the hills of Adair County, Kentucky, on land first settled by a Giles ancestor in 1804 on a Revolutionary War Grant. It was here that she began her literary career with a trilogy of novels about life in the hills which remain to this day among her most popular works. While many others wrote of desperate mountain communities saved by outsiders, Giles wrote in The Enduring Hills, Miss Willie, and Tara's Healing of desperate outsiders who moved into mountain communities to "do good," but found that the strong hill folk could help them to get their own lives together! No wonder these books are so popular among native mountaineers! When Janice Holt Giles' husband became a little sensitive to the literary fame of his wife, she responded by working with him on a novel, Harbin's Ridge, which was initially published under his name alone. Janice Holt Giles' power as a historical novelist was clearly established by Hannah Fowler, the story of a strong pioneer woman, and The Believers, a novel of the Shaker religious community which presents a touching portrait of a woman oppressed by religious fanaticism.

When the Army Corps of Engineers dammed up the Green River, the Giles' were forced to rebuild, completing their new home in 1958. Almost all Giles books before were set in the Kentucky hills. After this move, Janice Holt Giles devoted most of her energy to writing about the West and to autobiographical writing. Here she produced six very popular Western novels, including three adopted by book clubs, Johnny Osage, Savanna, and Voyage to Santa Fe. Janice Holt Giles died at the home she described re-building in A Little Better Than Plumb on June 1, 1979 at the age of 70.

Janice Holt Giles was a farm wife whose avocation was writing. This gave her a true feeling for what life was really like for hill people, yet it probably also kept her from receiving the academic attention she deserves. Her much-loved non-fiction personal experience books, her trilogy of books which examine the hill country culture, and especially her historical novels of both the early and later West all are based on thorough scholarship. Her books deal with universal themes and display a deep and broad spectrum of thought and insight. They retain a devoted audience today and deserve more critical attention.

A Janice Holt Giles Bibliography

The Enduring Hills by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Westminister Press, 1950. 256-pages.
    Giles' first novel , the story of a mountain boy who must come home.   **Click here to order**

Miss Willie by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Westminister Press, 1951. 268-pages.
    A novel of a woman that comes to the hills to teach and finds that she has even more to learn from the Kentucky hill community where she settles. This is a perennial favorite with Kentucky and Appalachian readers who love to see the "locals" come across as wiser than the outside "do-gooder."    **Click here to order**

Tara's Healing by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Westminister, 1951. 253 pages.
    The third in this trilogy, Giles’ third book centers on another professional, a doctor, who also finds he has more to receive than to give in caring for the simple folks of the Kentucky hills.  **Click here to order**

The Kentuckians by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1953. 272-pages.
    A novel of frontier Kentucky, this was Giles’ very first historical novel.  **Click here to order**

Hill Man by John Garth (pseudonym for Janice Holt Giles).
New York: Pyramid Books, 1954.
    Giles' only book issued with a pen name--John Garth.  **Click here to order**

The Plum Thicket by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1954. 284-pages.
    A novel set out West following the pioneer days.  **Click here to order**

Hannah Fowler by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1956. 312-pages.
    Another of Giles’ most-loved books this is a novel of a strong Kentucky pioneer woman whose exciting adventures include being captured by Indians.  **Click here to order**

The Believers by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1957. 302 pages.
    This is a novel about the Shakers who settled in Kentucky. It illuminates the problems of religious fanaticism, particularly what a pain it is for a woman to be married to a religious fanatic.  **Click here to order**

The Land Beyond the Mountains by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1958. 308 pages.
    This is a novel of a family's westward trek.  **Click here to order**

Johnny Osage by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1960. 313 pages.
    A novel depicting the complicated relationships between Indians and Whites. Set in the Arkansas/Oklahoma country where Giles was born and raised.  **Click here to order**

Savanna by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1961. 397 pages.
    Another novel, featuring a strong woman, this one set in the West.   **Click here to order**

Voyage to Santa Fe by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1962.
    Another novel of a westward trek.  **Click here to order**

Run Me a River by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1964. 337 pages.
    This Civil War novel is set on Kentucky's Green River many miles downstream from the Giles' farm near Mamouth Cave.  **Click here to order**

The Great Adventure by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1966. 370 pages.
Another historical novel of the Old West.   **Click here to order**

Shady Grove by Janice Holt Giles. New York, Houghton-Mifflin, 1967. 260-
pages.
    Giles' funniest and most requested novel, set in the hill country.   **Click here to order**

Six-Horse Hitch by Janice Holt Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1968.
436 pages .
    Giles' last historical novel of the West.  **Click here to order**

The Damned Engineers by Janice Hot Giles. New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 1970.
    A non-fiction critique of the world-wide policies and actions of the Army
Corps of Engineers, the agency that caused the Giles’ to have to move from their
beloved log cabin to make way for an Army Corp lake.  **Click here to order**