Literary Friday, Edition 205
Interview & Chat With Burying the Honeysuckle Girls Author Emily D. Carpenter
One of the most talked about books of the summer (and one of the most beautiful covers), Emily D. Carpenter’s Burying the Honeysuckle Girls has all the makings of a Southern Gothic novel: a swampy Alabama setting, overpowering flowering vine, long-buried secrets and a tinge of the supernatural. Main character Althea Bell is in a race against time to find out what happened to the women in her family on their 30th birthdays before hers arrives. Her mother told her to wait for “the honeysuckle girl,” but will Althea be able to find this mythical woman? We talked to Carpenter about using her home state of Alabama as a character, the allure of honeysuckle and what she’s working on next.
Chat with her on Twitter from 1-2 CST ((2-3 EST, 11 a.m.-noon PST) today using the hashtag #southernlit. You can also enter to win a copy of Burying The Honeysuckle Girls using the Rafflecopter below through Monday.
Literary News
Cormac McCarthy made headlines at the end of June when a Twitter account affiliated with Alfred A. Knopf tweeted he had died. It was all a hoax, and the LA Times explains why Cormac McCarthy is too tough to die.
O Magazine has released its Summer Book List with Laurence Leamer’s The Lynching, Tig Notaro’s I’m Just a Person and our own summer read Underground Airlines.
Find more reads in SIBA’s OKRA Picks, Southern titles fresh off the vine.
Bustle has 15 Great Appalachian Novels That Reflect The Unique Culture of the Region.
Connect Savannah has an interview with Harry Crews biographer Ted Geltner, who will be signing books at The Book Lady Today before a screening of the Crews documentary “Guilty As Charged.”
Literary Events, Workshops & Contests
South Florida Poetry Journal is seeking poetry submissions for its August issue. Send three unpublished poems and a brief bio to [email protected].
Flat Rock Playhouse will debut two new plays at the Carl Sandburg Home in North Carolina. “Spink, Skabootch and Swipes in Rootabaga Country” will be performed Wednesdays and Fridays through August 12, and “Rootabaga Express” will be performed Thursdays and Saturdays from through August 13.
The 36th annual Hemingway Days Celebration in Key West, Florida, is scheduled for July 19-24 this year. Events include a lookalike contest for Hemingway imitators, prose and poetry readings and a three-day marlin tournament.
Mr. Toole, a new play about the life of John Kennedy Toole (pictured) written by one of his former students, is being performed at the Mid-Town International Theater Festival in New York July 21-31.
Writer’s Digest Editor Brian A. Klems will be a featured speaker for a How to Get Published workshop in Nashville, Tennessee, July 23.
The deadline for submissions to the 2016 Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence is August 15. The contest, which includes a $10,000 prize, is open to fiction (novels or short story collections) published in 2016.
Register now for The Writer’s High Retreat with Joshilyn Jackson and Michael Morris September 9-11 at Brasstown Valley Resort in Young Harris, Georgia.
Save the dates for upcoming book festivals, including the Mississippi Book Festival August 20, Decatur Book Festival September 2-4 and Southern Festival of Books in Nashville October 14-16.
The Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival has announced that Dorothy Allison will judge this year’s Fiction Contest. Deadline to enter is November 30, and grand prize is $1,500.
New In Southern Voice
Splintered, a new Dorothy Jane story about a child’s relationship with her father after her mother dies, by Collier McLeod.
To find out more about your favorite Southern authors’ haunts and hangouts, download the Deep South Literary Trail App, available direct from iTunes and for Android and perfect for those winter road trips.
Have a piece of news, event, video or something else related to Southern lit that you’d like us to consider for Literary Friday? Send an e-mail to [email protected].
