Southern coal: take a trip back in time

When I was about 20, I had my first introduction to coal mining in the South. I took a camping trip with my parents along the Shenandoah Valley, to Luray Caverns and Big Meadows Campground. On the way back to North Carolina, we stopped to bike a trail that lead to the "ghost town" of Thurmond, WV, a former coal mining town. The town, of course, was deserted, apart from one tiny souvenir shop where I bought a train made out of coal for my boyfriend. There was rumor of a murder that had taken place in the old hotel -- something about money lost over gambling -- and as we climbed the hill to where the few remaining residents lived, the atmostphere grew eerier, and I imagined the ghosts of the town (and the 7 or so people still living there) watching us. We got out of there pretty quickly!

Needless to say, my impressions of coal mining are not pleasant -- a necessary, dirty, and dangerous job for people who have few options. While lots of nonfiction books explore coal mining, I had a hard time finding many Southern fiction books about it. Susan Tekulve of Spartanburg, SC, caught my attention -- she recently won the 2012 S.C. First Novel Competition (sponsored by the S.C. Arts Commission and Hub ity Press of Spartanburg) for her novel The Nipper. Her book follows the lives of a coal mining Italian immigrant family as they struggle to survive in a tiny Virginia town.

Gin Phillips, author of The Well and the Mine, tells a fictional tale of a real-life Alabama coal-mining town, Carbon Hill, in 1931. The novel begins with a shocking act of violence, as a baby is thrown into a family well. Publisher's Weekly describes the story: "A tight-knit miner's family struggles against poverty and racism in Phillips's evocative first novel, set in Depression-era Alabama."

Hazard, a novel by Gardiner Harris describes a mine disaster in Hazard, KY, and the repercussions that follow. A reviewer in The Washington Post writes that Harris used to work in Hazard, Ky., as the Eastern Kentucky bureau chief for the Louisville Courier-Journal. "His prize-winning reporting there was credited with helping pass laws that strengthened the state's mine-safety rules." The reviewer adds, "Harris understands the fatalism of miners who know their jobs can kill them."

Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2012/07/29/2370112/southern-literatures-next-star.html#storylink=cpy

Join the ebook/indy controversy!

There are some great discussions going on right now (on Twitter, blogs) about the state of ebooks and indie publishing. Join in and add your two cents -- are ebooks priced too low? If so, who does this hurt? Or is anything fair in the race to gain readership?

Indy author Catherine Ryan Howard has a great post (and follow-up discussion in comments), "Low E-book Pricing: The Compensation Problem," where she discusses a recent spat at the Harrogate Crime Festival. Writes Howard on her blog, Catherine, Caffeinated:

"During a panel discussion called Wanted for Murder: The E-book (for anyone surprised at what happened, shouldn’t that title have been your first clue?) bestselling crime writers Mark Billingham and Laura Lippman, seated in the audience, got into a bit of a heated debate with the panelists, one of whom was mega-selling cheap e-book author Stephen Leather."

Blogger Pam McIlroy tweeted about an article in The Guardian that discussed Sony's decision to offer a range of 20p titles in its new Reader Store.

And journalist and fiction writer Scott Bury tweeted and blogged about independent writers deserving more respect in the publishing world. From his blog, Written Words:

"We need to start talking about independent writers, those who control the publishing function themselves, in the same we we do about independent filmmakers and independent musicians. "Indie" group Arcade Fire, after all, won a Grammy."

Southern writing contests...

Here are a few writing contests, set in the South, but not necessarily just for Southern writers!

Black Warrior Review, based out of Tuscaloosa, AL, is a great journal, full of artwork, poetry, and prose. Three prizes of $1,000 each (plus publication) are given each year for a single poem, short story, and a work of nonfiction. The $15 entry fee includes a subscription to the journal. Deadline is September 1, 2012.

Gival Press, based out of Arlington, VA, offers a prize of $1,000 and publication on the press's website for a short story. Entry fee is $25, and the deadline is August 8th.

North Carolina Humanities Council offers the Linda Flowers Literary Award each year for a work of poetry, fiction, or creative nonfiction that reflects the people and culture of NC. The winner receives $500, publication in North Carolina Conversations, and a weeklong residency at the Weymouth Center for the Arts and Humanties. There is no entry fee, and the deadline is August 15.

Snake Nation Press, based out of Valdosta, GA, is offering the Violet Reed Haas Prize for Poetry and the Serena McDonald Kennedy award for fiction. Winners receive $1,000 and publication. The entry fee is $25, and the deadline is August 31.

Glossary of Southernisms

The good folks at www.alphadictionary.com are offering a "Glossary of Quaint Southernisms." I've lived in the South (NC) for more than 20 years, but not having been born here, I still don't feel like an expert on the dialect! Some of these I recognize, like "fixin" and "catty-corner" and "conniption" (one of my favorites!), but others I've never heard of ("chinchy"?).

I like what they say in their intro., as I get mad when people judge others unfairly, based on an accent:

"Your accent has nothing at all to do with intelligence or knowledge of the rules of grammar. It is simply a regional dialect and dialects are equally grammatical; they are simply slight variations in the grammar of a given language that characterize the various regions where that language is spoken."

What does it mean to be Southern?

Southern writer Melinda McGuire blogs about what it means to be a writer in the South, and on June 12 she featured a great guest post from Andi Kay, a fellow blogger and book reviewer. Andi's blog is called Anakalian Whims.

Andi talks about her favorite Southern authors as she was growing up and gives one of the best descriptions of why we love Southern literature that I've read in a long time:

"[...] we’re really into our fried foods too. And family, and tradition, and comfort, and joy. And pie, can’t forget the pie. But we’re a protective and territorial bunch, proud of our roots, but happy to share.

"That’s why reading about it is so wonderful. We like feeling at home, and we like feeling invited, and a good deal of us are nosy as hell and just want to pick the brain of someone else. So what better addresses all of that than reading the work of a southern writer?"

More new Southern summer reads!

Back by popular demand (okay I just made that up!), here's another roundup of the latest Southern fiction to hit the book shelves...

Heading Out to Wonderful is Virgina native Robert Goolrick's second novel and is set in 1948. When a mysterious stranger comes back from the War and settles down in the village of Brownsburg, VA, all seems well until he sets his sights on teenage bride Sylvan Glass.

Some call South Carolina native Dorothea Benton Frank the "Queen of Southern Fiction," and whether you agree or not, she sure is prolific! Porch Lights is her 13th novel (according to her website) and tells the story of Jackie and her 10-year-old son as they return to Jackie's childhood home on Sullivan Island to recover from a family tragedy.

Husband and wife Rick and Sandra Dee Richardson teamed up to write Southern Secrets: Sins of the Past, a novel based on the real history of the last slaves brought to America. Rick hails from Alabama, and his great-great grandmother was actually on the final slave ship Clotilda, which docked in Mobile Bay.

Tayari Jones in Chapel Hill!

Atlanta native Tayari Jones talked about the complicated dynamics of extended families at Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill last night. Her latest and third novel, Silver Sparrow, is told from the perspectives of two daughters with the same father – the catch is that Chaurisse is legitimate, and Dana is the product of the father’s secret marriage. Although Jones doesn’t have the same background as the girls – she has half-sisters by legal means – she found ways to identify with both of them though a kind of “emotional autobiography,” using feelings and memories from her own life and family relationships.

 Everyone knows what it feels like not to belong, like Dana, who must keep her family life a secret. “I try to find out where I have a version of that myself,” Jones said.

 She started her novel with the feeling that she wanted to write a book about sisters, and the idea of bigamy sprouted from that. As we’ve seen in cases like John Edwards’, secret families are more common that we think, Jones said, but are taboo because children are involved. Readers will sometimes come up to Jones after a reading and say, “I’m a silver sparrow,” meaning that they’re a child from a secret marriage.

Jones has already started her fourth novel, which will likely be about a man wrongfully accused of a crime. When he is suddenly freed from prison, he has to pick up the pieces of his relationship with his wife – another complex topic! “What is our obligation to people who get out of prison?” Jones asked.

She’s written more than 100 pages so far, so she’s pretty confident the novel will “take”! Jones doesn’t outline her plot beforehand: “I like to feel breathless and stressed out when I write,” she said, because that’s the way she believes people like to read, too, with a feeling of anticipation and what’s going to happen next?

 As well as giving readings throughout the country, Jones is an Associate Professor in the MFA program at Rutgers-Newark University and is spending the 2011-12 academic year at Harvard University as a Radcliffe Institute Fellow, researching her fourth novel. Check out this dynamic writer!

New indie bookstore near Manteo, NC

I was so excited to read this morning that a new bookstore is opening in Duck, North Carolina, a tiny town in the Outer Banks! The store is called Duck's Cottage Downtown Books and features a hand-picked selection of books, as well as tea and coffee and toys for the kids. Read all about it in the Outer Banks Sentinal.

The science behind fiction

If you're a crime or mystery writer, you may want to check out Marianne Wheelaghan's blog, where she gives a great overview of a talk by forensic anthropologist Sue Black. Attending talks by people in the police/forensics field is an excellent way to do background research for a novel. I went to a similar kind of talk a few months ago --  a Crime Scene Investigator from the Durham Police Department discussed taking photographs at crime scenes. I learned a lot about how the police secure a crime scene, document all angles of the area, and manage to take photographes in the pitch black to capture as much information as possible. After the talk, I realized I hadn't thought through the murder scene of my novel thoroughly -- it was a real wake-up call!

I don't know how up to date it is, but WritersWrite offers some good links for authors needing to research the police and other justice/crime info. And if any local groups in your area feature guest speakers from the police department, it's definitely worth checking out.

Southern mysterioso...

Hello, Everyone! I have another batch of new Southern fiction for your perusal, all dealing with  mystery in some way. Nothing is off limits -- we even have a psychic waitress who sees vampires!

A Grown-up Kind of Pretty is Georgia resident Joshilyn Jackson's fifth novel, a mystery about a family of young mothers. Here's what it says on her website about this novel: "When a long-hidden grave is unearthed in the backyard, headstrong young Mosey Slocumb is determined to investigate. What she learns could cost her family everything…"

Mississippi Cotton is Paul Yarbrough's first novel. He was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi, and his novel describes rural Mississippi in the 1950’s, as told by 10-year-old Jake Conner. Although the novel begins with a murder, the tale is more about the history of the Southern people and their controversial relationship with the Civil War.

Deadlocked is the 12th in Charlaine Harris's Southern Vampire series and follows psychic, small-town Southern waitress Sookie Stackhouse as she works to solve a murder case. Harris is a native of the Mississippi River Delta area and has been publishing novels since 1981.