Randy Turner

Randy Turner is a former eighth grade English teacher and a long time award-winning newspaper reporter and editor in southwest Missouri. His latest book, co-authored with John Hacker, is the expanded 10th anniversary edition of their 2011 book, 5:41: Stories from the Joplin Tornado. Turner was a teacher in one of the Joplin schools that was destroyed during the May 22, 2011 tornado. Turner's 13 non-fiction books include the recent The Buck Starts Here: Harry S. Truman and the City of Lamar, a biography of the 33rd president and the history of the small Missouri town where he was born, and Lost Angels: The Murders of Rowan Ford and Doug Ringler. He has also written three novels- Small Town News, Devil's Messenger and No Child Left Alive. Turner is the author of the popular blogs, The Turner Report and Inside Joplin.