The Southern Literary Review celebrates Southern authors and their contributions to American literature. We feature classic writers who have defined Southern literature, and we highlight emerging authors with interviews, profiles, and book reviews. We support independent bookstores. If you subscribe to our newsletter, please add southernliteraryreview@comcast.net to your email contacts list so that the newsletter doesn’t […]
“How Simi Got Her Groom Back” by Sonali Dev
March 2, 2026 by Leave a Comment
How much do you owe the older sister who raised you and protected you from a harsh, unforgiving childhood? That question lies at the heart of Sonali Dev’s charming romantic comedy How Simi Got Her Groom Back (Lake Union 2026). Most of us would agree we owe such a sister a great deal—but would we offer her […]
“Lost in the Forest of Mechanical Birds” by Christian Moody
February 18, 2026 by 1 Comment
Winner of the 2023 Dzanc Short Story Collection, Christian Moody’s Lost in the Forest of Mechanical Birds is an imaginative collection comprised of four short stories and a novella. Moody’s eccentric characters find themselves in altered realities involving comical situations. His wonder tales question the peripheries of one’s imagination versus reality. And though the author’s […]
“The Other Revival” by Salaam Green
February 18, 2026 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Tina Mozelle Braziel and James Braziel Walt Whitman contains multitudes, and so does Salaam Green’s debut collection The Other Revival: Poems & Reckonings (Pulley Press 2025). A certified listening poet, Green put her vast skills to work at the Wallace House in Harpersville, AL as a poet-in-residence, interviewing descendants of the enslaved and […]
James and Tina Mozelle Braziel
February 16, 2026 by Leave a Comment
James and Tina Mozelle Braziel are a husband-and-wife writing team. They have received fellowships from Hot Springs National Park and Alabama State Council on the Arts. James Braziel’s book, This Ditch-Walking Love (Livingston Press), winner of the Tartt Fiction Award, tells the stories of people living on Alabama’s Cumberland Plateau. His novels Birmingham, 35 Miles (Bantam) and Snakeskin Road (Bantam) […]
“Fatulous” by Heather Ream
February 15, 2026 by Leave a Comment
Fatulous by Heather Ream is the sequel to her first memoir, Lunch Ladies Bought My Prom Dress. In this book, we are introduced to Heather when she is a freshman in college, and we follow her through her experiences for several years until she finally graduates. If you were a victim of, or want to […]
Ben Guest interviews Steve Suitts, author of “What’s In a Family Name: A Southern Family History Becomes a Gothic Mystery”
February 11, 2026 by Leave a Comment
SUMMARY: Steve Suitts was seventy-two years old when he tracked down his grandfather’s birth certificate and discovered his grandfather had died eighteen months before his father was born. What follows, in his new memoir, What’s In A Family Name: A Southern Family History Becomes a Gothic Mystery, is a detective story as Suitts traces his […]