Essay by Glynn Custred There are several ways a novel can become a bestseller. At one end of the scale are the author’s name recognition and heavy investment in an aggressive marketing campaign. At the other end is the widespread appeal of what the story has to say and how well it is said, expressing […]
September Read of the Month: “The Wiregrass,” by Pam Webber
August 31, 2015 by 1 Comment
Reviewed by Phil Jason It’s 1969 and helicopters drum above the town of Crystal Springs, Alabama twice a day. At ten each morning they leave Fort Rucker for a training field: Field 10. Twelve hours later, the choppers leave in formation to make the return trip. The scheduled explosions of light and noise define the […]
“The Path Was Steep,” by Susan Pickett
September 18, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Morgan O’Grady Susan Pickett was on my mind as I crossed Alabama’s state line after leaving West Virginia the same morning: her well-fed babies, her cutting hair in the yard and selling the excess food from her father’s land. She was an Alabama native transplanted to West Virginia during the Depression. Her memoir, […]
“The Mockingbird Next Door,” by Marja Mills
September 2, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Allen Mendenhall Nelle Harper Lee has been embroiled in lawsuits over the last couple of years and making headlines for her alleged litigiousness. Marja Mills’s The Mockingbird Next Door is a welcome and timely look at Nelle (as her friends and family call her) from another angle, one that offers us a fuller […]
“The Salvation of Miss Lucretia,” by Ted Dunagan
July 24, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Mollie Waters The Salvation of Miss Lucretia is the fourth installment in Ted Dunagan’s series for young adult readers. The books feature two young boys, one white and one black, who are able to overcome the difficulties of the segregated South during the 1940s in order to form a lasting friendship. In their […]
“Emigration to Liberia,” by Matthew F.K. McDaniel
April 30, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Allen Mendenhall Emigration to Liberia is the story of the nearly 500 African-Americans who left Columbus, Georgia, and Eufaula, Alabama, from 1853 to 1903, to emigrate to Liberia, the West African nation that was founded in 1822 by United States colonization. Matthew F.K. McDaniel marshals evidence from written correspondence and newspapers to piece […]