CHRISTA PIKE

On September 30, 2026, Tennessee tried to execute Christa Pike. The state failed.

For thirty years, she was the only woman on Tennessee’s death row. Then a lethal injection did not work, the governor halted every execution in the state, and one of the most notorious murder cases in America became a national scandal.

But the story did not begin in an execution chamber. It began in January 1995, when a nineteen-year-old Job Corps student named Colleen Slemmer was lured into the woods outside Knoxville by people she believed were making peace with her.

This book follows the complete true story, based on court records and verified reporting:

The crime: How a jealous 18-year-old, her violent boyfriend, and a third student carried out a killing that shocked a nation
The trial: Why a jury sentenced Pike to death while her co-defendants received probation and a chance at parole
The defense: The childhood abuse, neglect, and untreated mental illness her lawyers say the jury never fully heard
The long fight: Thirty years of appeals, a prison attack, a foiled escape plot, and the legal battle over where the line between youth and adulthood should be drawn
The failed execution: A minute-by-minute account of the witnesses’ reports from the night everything went wrong
The fallout: The governor’s review, a resignation, and the questions that remain unanswered

You will also hear from the victim’s side. Colleen Slemmer’s mother has waited more than three decades for an ending that has still not come.

Fair, carefully sourced, and told without invented dialogue, this is the account for readers who want the facts behind the headlines and both sides of the debate.

Scroll up and click “Buy Now” to read the true story of Christa Pike.