Introduction: I met Margaret Seidler at USCB in January at the opening reception for her book, “Payne-Ful” Business Charleston’s Journey To Truth. Her narrative is combined with artwork based on the advertisements for the sale of enslaved people, painted by John W. Jones. After Margaret spoke, I went right up to her and said “I’m […]
“‘Payne-Ful’ Business: Charleston’s Journey to Truth” by Margaret Seidler
June 17, 2025 by Leave a Comment
Margaret Seidler’s book, “Payne-Ful” Business: Charleston’s Journey To Truth, is going to be known in the future as a pivotal point in changing history. Margaret has not written “another” book about slavery, it is not a memoir where she feels sorry for her circumstances, it is a wake-up call to embrace the kind of knowledge […]
Allen Mendenhall Interviews Lorna Hollifield, Author of “Tobacco Sun”
August 14, 2017 by Leave a Comment
AM: Thanks, Lorna, for doing this interview. The title of your debut novel is Tobacco Sun. I want to ask you about that title, but first I want to quote from some opening lines of the book. “Tobacco,” you say, “a strangely fragile, yet willful crop, desperate for survivorship, proved it could somehow adapt to […]
“The Cigar Factory: A Novel of Charleston,” by Michele Moore
June 28, 2016 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Daniel James Sundahl I recall my first visit to Charleston a year or so after Hurricane Hugo. Driving south to north along the coastal roads, I made side trips into the South Carolina Low Country where I found isolation and the remnants of the Gullah people. I had been unbeknownst driving along and […]
Katie DePoppe
April 7, 2016 by Leave a Comment
Katie DePoppe is an award-winning freelance writer, developmental editor, and former book publicist. She was born and raised in Charleston, South Carolina. In 2009, she became the founding editor at large for Azalea Media, a media company that produces three regional lifestyle and cultural publications throughout South Carolina and Georgia. This endeavor led to the […]
December Read of the Month: “Return to Tradd Street,” by Karen White
December 4, 2014 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Lynn Braxton When Charleston Realtor Melanie Middleton inherits an historic house from a benefactor she met only once, Charlestonians wonder what coercion she employed to gain the property, not realizing that Melanie has a pronounced dislike for old houses, branding the crumbling ruins as money pits. To make matters worse, and 55 Tradd […]