The Southern Literary Review celebrates southern authors and their contributions to American literature. We feature the classic writers who have defined southern literature, and we highlight emerging authors through interviews, profiles, and book reviews. In an effort to back independent bookstores and to encourage creativity in the publishing world, SLR is an IndieBound supporter.
February Read of the Month: “Midnight at the Tuscany Hotel,” by James Markert
February 19, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Claire Hamner Matturro Lush, mystical, and complex, Midnight at the Tuscany Hotel by Kentucky author James Markert is a stunning book. It begins with a foundling child abandoned at an orphanage in Florence, Italy, 1866, and ends on a California cliff in modern times—but oh what a journey the author takes his readers […]
“Handkerchiefs and Handcuffs,” Essay by John S. Maguire
February 13, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Essay by John S. Maguire I woke up Saturday morning, early as usual, so I could have the one TV in the house to myself. I was an avid cartoon watcher and I wanted to watch the Saturday morning cartoons that I looked forward to every other day of the week. Entering the living room […]
John S. Maguire
February 12, 2020 by Leave a Comment
John S. Maguire is a Telecommunications and FM Broadcast consultant living in Oklahoma City. He obtained a degree in English from Texas Christian University and at 53 years old went back to graduate school and obtained a Master in Fine Arts from Oklahoma City University.
Allen Mendenhall Interviews Johnnie Bernhard, Author of “Sisters of the Undertow”
January 29, 2020 by Leave a Comment
AM: Johnnie, I’m so happy to see Sisters of the Undertow in its final form. I’ve waited months to hold it in my hand! I enjoyed spending the weekend together at the Mississippi Book Festival last year. We had a great panel, didn’t we? JB: It was a great panel of literary discussion with you […]
Allen Mendenhall Interviews Charles D. Thompson, Author of “Going Over Home”
January 23, 2020 by Leave a Comment
AM: Grateful for this interview, Charles. Your latest book is Going Over Home, published by Chelsea Green Publishing. It comes with the endorsement of none other than Willie Nelson! Until I opened it and started reading, I didn’t realize it was a memoir. I had been expecting—what exactly? Something academic? A polemic? Your tenacity is […]
Devi S. Laskar, Chapel Hill Native, Wins $5,000 Crook’s Corner Book Prize
January 22, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Devi S. Laskar’s The Atlas of Reds and Blues, published by Counterpoint Press, is the winner of the seventh annual Crook’s Corner Book Prize for best debut novel set in the American South. This year’s judge was National Book Award-winning author Charles Frazier, who says, “I loved the very focused and concise ideas and dramatic […]
Allen Mendenhall Interviews Douglas Dell, Author of “Deep and Dirty”
January 15, 2020 by Leave a Comment
AM: “The funny thing about The South,” says the narrator in the prologue to your debut novel, Deep and Dirty, “is that it’s pretty, an odd choice of word but highly practical, take away the disasters sitting on almost every other corner and you’ll notice nature has this way of battling human influence by blotting out […]