"Whenever I'm asked why Southern writers particularly have a penchant for writing about freaks, I say it is because we are still able to recognize one."
-Flannery O'Connor
Well, I thought I was going to take a break from posting for a while and what do I do but sign up for the Southern Reading Challenge. The challenge is to read three books about the South by southern authors between May 15 and August 15. I think I can handle that.
The three authors I chose are just barely southern, not from the Deep South, but from Kentucky, close to my hometown. The first two are about hard times in southern Appalachia. The third is a memoir by one of my favorite female writers from the South.
My three are:
Icy Sparks by Gwyn Hyman Rubio
Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund
Clear Springs by Bobbie Ann Mason
If you would like to join in, click on the link above.
"In the South, perhaps more than any other region, we go back to our home in dreams and memories, hoping it remains what it was on a lazy, still summer's day twenty years ago."
----Willie Morris
Okay, I amended my list and removed the Jesse Stuart book, because it is really BORING! I've replaced it with Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund which isn't technically set in the South, but the main character is from Kentucky and brings her Kentucky ways to the Atlantic Coast, namely Nantucket. It looks vastly more interesting.
