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Joshilyn Jackson’s “Between, Georgia” reminds us that we are not lonely people. No matter where our lives take us, our families will follow.  When we meet our narrator, Nonny Jane, she is recounting the story of her birth and simultaneously introducing us to a small town family feud that will grow up with her. Born a distinctly red-headed Crabtree, Nonny comes to belong to the Frett family whose members include three dark-haired, thick-skinned sisters: Bernese, the town matriarch, and her twin siblings Genny and Stacia. It is Stacia, born def and destined to lose her eye sight by middle age, who decides that the Frett family will raise Nonny. (more…)

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If you were asked to imagine an ongoing chronicle of life in the American South from the late 1600’s through the 1970’s, you might picture snapshots of agriculture, slavery, the Civil War and segregation. Nicholas and Dallas Reed’s “Deep Family” offers a different take on Southern life as it was experienced by three, progressive, wealthy families (the Baldwins, Craiks and Reads) living in Montgomery, Alabama.

Elaborating far beyond typical family lore, Nicholas and his wife, Dallas, weave family myths with information gathered from 500 plus letters they discover in Nicholas’ mother’s attic and in other heirloom boxes. (more…)

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Women hear voices. Some are the voices of those that they love and care for, some are voices that come from the mouths of men they’ve met only once in their lives and some are voices that can only be described as divine. Reading Darnell Arnoult’s “Sufficient Grace” reminded me that most of the women in my life are taking care to listen to the world around them in tandem with the world inside of themselves. In the space that exists between listening and reacting, these women find their inspiration.

Gracie Hollaman is a woman who begins paying more attention to her own voices at the opening of the book, when the messages and omens in her life are only just beginning to make sense to her. When her husband, Ed, comes home to a well-cooked meal with Gracie’s shredded credit cards in the center of his dining room table and a missing Buick, he only begins to understand that the woman he has been married to for thirty years has been “called” away. (more…)