Book excerpt: This is the amazing story of Violet Jean Anderson Gerber (known as Jean), which begins in the Great Depression and follows her life as a mother, missionary, and unwitting friend of infamous mother and son serial killers, Sante and Kenny Kimes. Born and raised in Soup Bone Holler, a poor section of Clinton, Indiana, Jean was the eighth of nine children in a poverty-stricken family. After studying for many years to earn a degree in Spanish from the University of Arizona, Jean raised a family, became a social worker, and suffered the pain of divorce. She became a soldier in the Salvation Army in her 50s, serving as a missionary in the Bahamas, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, Cuba, and Mexico. It was in the Bahamas where Jean met and became friends with Ken and Sante Kimes and their young son, Kenny. Jean's story follows the family as Sante and Kenny descended from wealth and privilege into a life of lies, thievery, and the murder of at least three people. Jean herself was unsuccessfully used as a pawn in what was called "the crime of the decade" in the 1990s, the disappearance and murder of New York socialite Irene Silverman.