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.
“Far Beyond the Gates,” by Philip Lee Williams
November 25, 2020 by 1 Comment
Reviewed by Kathleen M. Rodgers Can a story save us? Do the stories we tell ourselves and others shape and define us? Can we ever break out of those stories to get to the truth, the truth behind secrets that have the capacity to both hurt and heal us when they’re finally revealed? In Far […]
Kathleen M. Rodgers
November 24, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Kathleen M. Rodgers is a novelist and has penned numerous articles for Family Circle Magazine and Military Times. She is a 2020 MWSA Writer of the Year Finalist and received the 2020 MWSA Founder’s Award for her third novel, Seven Wings to Glory. Her fourth novel, The Flying Cutterbucks, released June 2020 from Wyatt-MacKenzie.
“CRASH,” by Louis Gallo
November 19, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Aaron Lee Moore Louis Gallo’s latest collection of cerebral poetry, CRASH, lives up to its title as a thrilling, haunting, and emotionally undulating read. The cover of the book announces its overall theme well—an intriguing black and white photo capturing the pinnacle of a wave as it crashes upon shoreline rocks with the […]
Aaron Lee Moore
November 17, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Aaron Lee Moore is an Associate Research Fellow in the Department of Comparative and World Literature at Sichuan University. He is also Editor-in-Chief of the print literary journal Floyd County Moonshine (www.floydshine.com). His poetry chapbook, The Snapping of the Stick, is available from Finishing Line Press and Amazon. His work has appeared in Cold Mountain Review, CLCWeb: Comparative […]
“Rules for the Southern Rulebreaker,” by Katherine Snow Smith
November 12, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Rhonda J. Ray Reading Katherine Snow Smith’s Rules for the Southern Rulebreaker (She Writes Press, 2019) is like bumping into an old friend or meeting someone you hope will be a friend. I grew up reading The News & Observer, delivered every morning to my family home located a half hour from North […]
Rhonda Ray
November 10, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Rhonda Ray is a retired English professor writing a coming-of-age memoir set on a North Carolina tobacco farm. An excerpt from the memoir is forthcoming in the anthology Being Home (Madville Publishing, 2021).
“Miraculum,” by Steph Post
November 5, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Honey Rand There must be something in the water in that part of Florida. Steph Post gets hers in Brooksville, and fantasy writer Piers Anthony drinks the water just a few miles north. Either way, whatever is in the water produces imaginative stories that readers love. The word miraculum doesn’t have contemporary meaning; […]
November Read of the Month: “Tampa Bay Noir,” edited by Colette Bancroft
November 3, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Claire Hamner Matturro Akashic Books has long made a name for itself with an impressive string of award-winning original noir anthologies; thus, it is no surprise that its latest, Tampa Bay Noir, continues in that edgy, first-rate, compellingly dark tradition. Edited by Tampa Bay Times Book Critic Colette Bancroft, Tampa Bay Noir contains […]