With the national popularity of films like The Help and television shows Treme and True Blood, it’s not surprising that Hollywood is going Southern in 2012. Boasting stories of war and competition, alternate history and adaptation of some of the greatest works of Southern literature, 2012 looks to be a banner year for the South on screen.

Starting with Dolly Parton, who’s starring in Joyful Noise opening today, intern Kati-Jane Hammet has compiled a list of the Southern-themed films and television shows coming out or in the works this year. So, set up your film-going calendar for January through December, which concludes with a huge Southern literary blockbuster on Christmas Day.

by Kati-Jane Hammet

A new photography exhibit in Water Valley showcases Mississippi’s past and present, including never before seen works by the late Jim Higgins.

A native New Englander, Erika Marks fell in love with New Orleans while studying architectural preservation at Tulane University. She also fell in love with a native named Ian, who taught her to make exotic dishes like gumbo. Hurricane Katrina drove the couple from the city, but New Orleans stayed on Erika’s mind through a move back to Maine and another to the Midwest. The story of a woman who leaves New Orleans with her two teenaged daughters for the quiet shores of an island off the coast of Maine became Marks’ first novel, “Little Gale Gumbo,” published October 4.

A much-requested followup to our annual Summer Reading List, Deep South’s Fall/Winter list invites you to curl up with a few mysteries, new releases & nonfiction reads from down South. You’ll recognize some of the authors on the list, from James Lee Burke to John Grisham and Karen White. Others may not be familiar, but we think you’ll want to know who New York Magazine is calling the next Cormac McCarthy and which author’s new novel is being compared to “Deliverance.”

We’ve also got plenty of anticipated second novels from authors whose first books are still being talked about. So, grab a blanket, light a fire and start reading.

15 artists. 12 rooms. 1 night only. It’s Oxford, Mississippi’s fifth-annual One Night Stand Motel Art Show. On October 29, the Ole Miss Motel will double as an art gallery for an evening, when 15 up and coming artists from Mississippi and Tennessee each transform a hotel room into their own gallery space.