Amador County – Friday, Feb. 24 is “Meth Awareness Night” at Clark’s Corner in Ione, with a “Shadow People” book launch.

Speakers will be Sheriff Martin Ryan, Calaveras County Sheriff's detective Josh Crabtree and former meth cook, Matthew Learned. They will speak about the impacts of meth addiction and meth-inspired violence in the California foothills.

Operation Care and Friday Night Live will have info about victim advocacy and youth prevention. Meet and greet book-signing is 6-7 p.m., and 7-8 p.m. are the speakers.

Ledger Dispatch’s Scott Thomas Anderson’s book, Shadow People: How Meth-Driven Crime is Eating at the Heart of Rural America, was published this year by the Coalition for Investigative Journalism.

The book is on sale locally at Well Read Books in Martell and Hein & Company in Jackson, and available on Amazon, which on Wednesday listed four glowing reviews. Four readers all awarded maximum five stars, including one by his former Folsom Lake College teacher, and others by local writers Mary Molina and Helen Bonner.

The book resulted from “spending more than 18 months as an embedded reporter with rural county law enforcement agencies and traveling to small towns across the United States.”

Robin Valencia, Program Coordinator of Amador Child Abuse Prevention Council said the “book deals a lot with child abuse and child neglect, as it relates to meth addiction and crime.”

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