New Stories from the South 2003: The Year's Best - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1565123956 ISBN 13: 9781565123953

Publisher: Algonquin Books, 2003

Synopsis

Many famous writers later (James Lee Burke, Barbara Kingsolver, Larry Brown, Tony Earley, William Gay), Ravenel still combs through over one hundred journals and magazines, regional and national, large and small, in search of the most talented authors coming out of the South. She still tracks down the newest voices before their breakouts, collecting the best renditions of the short-story genre. New Stories from the South has become sine qua non in creative-writing classes, in Southern-literature classes, for any serious writer following the competition, and above all, for any lover of Southern literature.The stories in the eighteenth volume of NEW STORIES FROM THE SOUTH carry on that tradition. Among the eighteen writers making their mark in this year's volume are Michael Knight, Donald Hays, John Dufresne, ZZ Packer, and Chris Offutt. This year's preface is by the preeminent Southern humorist and NPR regular Roy Blount, Jr.Each story is followed by the author's note about its origin. Readers will also find an updated list of magazines consulted by the editor, and a complete list of all the stories selected each year since the series' inception.

About this title

About the Author

Shannon Ravenel, a native of Charleston, South Carolina, serves as director of Shannon Ravenel Books, an Algonquin imprint, and lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Reviews

Now in its eighteenth year, this annual anthology continues to collect some of the best stories by writers from the South. Roy Blount's preface satirically notes that in the South, but not the North, people often act like they "don't know what to think" and that compared to the classic college football rivalry in the South between coaches Bobby Dodd and Bear Bryant, "the Harvard-Yale game is a panel discussion." Some of that edge can be glimpsed in Brad Vice's "Report from Junction," in which a drought strangles a small Texas town, and a borderline scholarship boy headed for Bear Bryant's water-starved training camp (where most eventually quit) nearly shoots a threatening oil man to release himself from the struggle and possible failure ahead. Lucy Corin's "Rich People" depicts a more comic encounter across class lines. Some other stories explore complicated family relationships, such as Dorothy Allison's "Compassion," where sisters struggle to accept (or resist) the fact of their mother's last days. James O'Laughlin
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Algonquin Books
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1565123956
• ISBN 13: 9781565123953
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384
• Editor: Ravenel Shannon