Serpent handling has featured prominently not only in academic literature, and my work takes seriously the influence that academics, novels, documentaries, and the like all play in shaping perceptions of serpent handling in both the eye of the public and themselves. As such, this “bibliography” ranges from academic articles and comedies, both of which in many ways are crucial to the study of serpent handling communities.
Non-Fiction Books
They Shall Take Up Serpents: Psychology of the Southern Snake-Handling Cult
Weston La Barre (1962)
Tests of Faith
Robert K. Holliday (1966)
Taking Up Serpents: Snake Handlers of Eastern Kentucky
David Kimbrough (1995)
Salvation on Sand Mountain: Snake Handling and Redemption in Southern Appalachia
Dennis Covington (1995)
The Serpent Handlers: Three Families and Their Faith
Fred Brown and Jeanne McDonald (2000)
Handling Serpents: Pastor Jimmy Morrow’s Narrative History of His Appalachian Jesus’ Name Tradition
Jimmy Morrow with Ralph W. Hood Jr. (2005)
Them That Believe: The Power and Meaning of the Christian Serpent-Handling Tradition
Ralph W. Hood Jr. and W. Paul Williamson (2008)
Salvation on Sand Mountain (15th Anniversary Edition)
David L. Kimbrough (2009)
In the House of the Serpent Handler: A Story of Faith and Fleeting Fame in the Age of Social Media
Julia C. Duin (2017)
Test of Faith: Signs, Serpents, Salvation
Lauren Pond (2017)
Snakes at the Altar: Serpent Handling in the Church of God
Daniel Tomberlin (2025)
Fiction Books
Game of Fools: The Story of Snake Handling Preacher Reverend Charley Coaltrain
Charles L. Wooten and Sharon Mitchell Wooten (2006)
