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Lady Banks' Commonplace Book

Lady Banks' Commonplace Book is a newsletter for people interested in Southern literature, sponsored by booksellers who are members of the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance (SIBA) and featuring an overview of literary news and events as found on Authors 'Round the South. Commonplace books first appeared during the Renaissance, where they were used as a way to deal the information overload of that era. They helped students select and organize tidbits of interest--medical recipes, quotes, letters, poems, proverbs, prayers, legal formulas. Commonplaces were used by readers, writers and students, and each commonplace book was unique to its owner. The Lady Banks climbing rose (Rosa banksaie) is ubiquitous throughout the South. It is one of the first roses to bloom in the spring, with its abundant yellow blossoms weighing down its thornless canes. Lady Banks roses have a sweet fragrance and can be found both in the carefully attended gardens of restored antebellum houses and in the ditches along country roads.

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July/August 2010: In the heat of a Southern Summer PDF Print E-mail
Written by Authors Round the South   
Wednesday, 11 August 2010 00:00

Lady Banks' Commonplace Book

In which her ladyship remembers things in color, it is decided that To Kill a Mockingbird would not work with dolphins, Mr. Pat Conroy says he is not afraid of eBooks, Mr. Sam McLeod meets some people who are not lawyers, Karin Gillespie insists she is not building bombs in her basement, while Kathy Patrick takes the baton (the kind that doesn’t have burning flames on either end),  the Chicago police confiscate thirty raccoon skins and are nonplussed in a way a Southern sheriff would never be, Mr. VS Naipaul is told that the words of southern songs matter, and a review asks, "Is southern literature going the way of the slamming screen door?"

Arts Calendar | STARS |Gossip |Okra | The Blogs | Read This! | Found in Lady Banks' Commonplace Book | On her ladyship's bookshelf | Author2Author


cameoDearest Readers,

Recently Kodak produced its last roll of Kodachrome camera film—the color film that has defined, for most of us, the colors of our past memories in hundreds of thousands of family photo albums. Kodak gave the roll to Mr. Steve McMurray, the man who took that famously stunning photograph (with Kodachrome film) of the young Afghan girl with the bright eyes that graced the most popular cover of National Geographic ever to be published.  The photographer now has the task of taking the last photos that will ever be shot with Kodachrome film.  It is the end of an era.

Bound for GloryThe beginnings of the era are perhaps earlier than you think. Some of the earliest Kodachrome photographs are from the Depression, when the FSA (Farm Security Administration) charged photographers to take pictures of, well, America. We are all familiar with the stunning black and white photos of pioneer photographers like Dorothea Lange. But some, like Jack Delano, used the new color film instead. And these present an America during the Depression that is inescapably poignant, often heart-rendingly familiar, and in vivid Technicolor.

You can see a collection of these Depression-era color photos here. And there is a book of the photographs as well. Quite a few are set in a South that, for people of her ladyship’s generation, has hitherto only been available to her in stories.

Chopping Cotton
Chopping cotton on rented land near White Plains. White Plains, Greene County, Georgia, June 1941. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Jack Delano. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

Juke Joint
A crossroads store, bar, "juke joint," and gas station in the cotton plantation area. Melrose, Louisiana, June 1940. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Marion Post Wolcott. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

boys fishing
Boys fishing in a bayou. Schriever, Louisiana, June 1940. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Marion Post Wolcott. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

In an age when even the cheapest cell phones come with digital cameras, and our personal lives in pixilated, washed out digital pictures are uploaded and shared with complete strangers and a ridiculous rate, we are lost among a maze of truly insignificant moments.

In the right hands, with the right camera, Kodachrome color film did just the opposite—finding beauty and significance in the most fleeting of gestures.

Her ladyship, the editor

Her ladyship, the editor


 

 

 

Authors 'Round the South

Authors Round the South is the home of one of the most extensive listings of literary events in the South, including author readings & appearances, book club meetings, book & literary festivals, open mics, poetry slams and writing groups. No matter what part of the South you live in, you can find a bookstore and author appearance near you!

Martin Amis, author of The Pregnant Widow at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 12 2010)

K.T. Archer, author of The Silver Spoon at Page & Palette in Fairhope, AL  (08/20/2010)

Dan Ariely, author of Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits o at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/14/2010)

Rosecrans Baldwin, author of You Lost Me There at Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill, NC  (August 12 2010) and at McIntyre's Fine Books in Pittsboro, NC  (August 14 2010)

Nevada Barr, author of Burn at Square Books in Oxford, MS  (August 12 2010)

Allen Barra, author of Rickwood Field: A Century in America's Oldest Ball at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/16/2010)

Ludwig Bemelmans, author of Madeline and the Gypsies at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (08/26/2010)

Pat Benatar, author of BETWEEN A HEART AND A ROCK PLACE: A MEMOIR at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (09/02/2010)

James R. Bennett, author of Iron & Steel: A Guide to Birmingham Area Industria at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/19/2010)

Hal Blackwell, author of Secrets of the Skim at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (08/14/2010)

Seth Bramson, author of Hallandale Beach, Florida at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 18 2010)

Sara Bright, author of Butterflies of Alabama at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/26/2010)

Nancy Brinker, author of Promise Me: How a Sister's Love Launched the Globa at Blue Elephant Book Shop in Decatur, GA  (09/23/2010)

Sarah Bush, author of The Invitation at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (09/10/2010)

Candace Chellew-Hodge, author of Bulletproof Faith at Bound to be Read in Atlanta, GA  (August 12 2010)

Annie Cohen-Solal, author of Leo and His Circle at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 15 2010)

Susan Coll, author of Beach Week at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 13 2010)

Gwen Cooper, author of HOMER'S ODYSSEY: A FEARLESS FELINE TALE, OR HOW I at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/18/2010)

Doreen Cronin, author of Rescue Bunnies at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/25/2010)

Ellen Crosby, author of The Viognier Vendetta at Fountain Bookstore in Richmond, VA  (August 27 2010)

L.J. Davenport, author of Nature Journal at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/26/2010)

Jeff Davidson, author of SIMPLER LIVING at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (08/11/2010)

Frank Deford, author of Bliss, Remembered at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/9/2010)

Anna Dewdney, author of Llama Llama Misses Mama at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (08/12/2010)

Amy Dickinson, author of [The Mighty Queens of Freeville: A Mother, a Daugh at Fountain Bookstore in Richmond, VA  (August 25 2010)

Diseen Duhamel, author of Poetry of Healing at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 28 2010)

Dave Eggers, author of Zeitoun at That Bookstore in Blytheville in Blytheville, AR  (08/16/2010)

Kathryn Erskine, author of Mockingbird at Page & Palette in Fairhope, AL  (08/14/2010) and at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/21/2010)

Pamela Fiori, author of In the Spirit of Capri at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 28 2010)

Stacy Fuchino, author of Head to Tail Wellness at Muse Book Shop in Deland, FL  (08/20/2010)

Chad Gibbs, author of God and Football: Faith and Fanaticism in the SEC at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/27/2010)

Connie Glass, author of I Wanted to Marry Emma at Park Road Books in Charlotte, NC  (August 15 2010)

Susan Gregg Gilmore, author of The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove at Fountain Bookstore in Richmond, VA  (August 23 2010)

Jason L Green, author of The Weeds Are Always Greener at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/20/2010)

Winston Groom, author of The Crimson Tide National Championship Edition: Th at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (09/03/2010)

Lesta Sue Hardee and Janice McDonald, author of Myrtle Beach Pavillion at Litchfield Books in Pawleys Island, SC  (08/20/2010)

Beth Webb Hart, author of Love Charleston at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (09/03/2010),
at Hub City Bookshop in Spartanburg, SC  (September 4 2010)and at Litchfield Books in Pawleys Island, SC  (09/10/2010)

AJ Hartley, author of Act of Will at Park Road Books in Charlotte, NC  (August 22 2010)

Alexia Jones Helsley, author of A History of North Carolina Wine at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (09/18/2010)

Hal Herzog, author of Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat: Why It's at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/10/2010)

Carl Hiaasen, author of Star Island at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 30 2010) and Inkwood Books in Tampa, FL  (September 2 2010)

Jeannie Holmes, author of Blood Law at Page & Palette in Fairhope, AL  (08/14/2010)

Naomi Howland, author of Princess Says Goodnight at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (08/19/2010)

Thomas Hudgin, author of THE ANDROS CONNECTIONHE ANDROS CONNECTION at Pomegranate Books in Wilmington, NC  (September 14 2010)

Batt Humphreys, author of Dead Weight at Burry Bookstore in Hartsville, SC  (08/19/2010)

Jennifer Joyner, author of Designated Fat Girl at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/23/2010)

Cassandra King, author of Queen of Broken Hearts at Burry Bookstore in Hartsville, SC  (09/09/2010)

Michael Knight, author of The Typist at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/25/2010) and at Page & Palette in Fairhope, AL  (08/26/2010)

Kathleen Koch, author of Rising from Katrina at That Bookstore in Blytheville in Blytheville, AR  (08/14/2010)

Lynn Kostoff, author of Late Rain at Litchfield Books in Pawleys Island, SC  (08/27/2010)

Cathy Langston, author of What It Means When God Goes On Strike at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/26/2010)

Michael Largo, author of God's Lunatics at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 17 2010)

JIm and Joyce Lavene, author of Deadly Daggers at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (09/17/2010)

Jeff Lindsay, author of Dexter Is Delicious at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (September 9 2010)

McKendree Long, author of No Good Like It Is at Park Road Books in Charlotte, NC  (August 21 2010)

Tom Lowe, author of The 24th Letter at Muse Book Shop in Deland, FL  (08/21/2010)

Kerry Madden, author of Up Close: Harper Lee at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/11/2010)

M. L. Malcolm, author of Heart of Lies at Litchfield Books in Pawleys Island, SC  (08/13/2010)

Michele Manderine, author of Tristan, The Maine Coon Cat at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/29/2010)

Leigh Somerville McMillan, author of It All Started With A Dog at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/28/2010)

Terry McMillan, author of Getting to Happy at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/14/2010)

Peggy Tabor Millin, author of Women, Writing, and Soul-Making: Creativity and th at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (08/22/2010)

Gary R. Mullen, author of Philip Henry Gosse at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (08/26/2010)

Georgia Mullen, author of Wixumlee at Pomegranate Books in Wilmington, NC  (August 24 2010)

Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Adam & Eve at Alabama Booksmith in Birmingham, AL  (09/28/2010)

Rachel Niketopolous, author of Storytime at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/26/2010)

HA Olsen, author of A Lone Palm Stands at Park Road Books in Charlotte, NC  (August 28 2010)

Ari Pinelli, author of Planeta Cuba at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 14 2010)

Kathy Poires, author of NEW STORIES FROM THE SOUTH 2010 at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (8/19/2010)

Dan Rattiner, author of Hamptons Too: Further Encounters with Farmers, Fis at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 22 2010)

Susan Reinhardt, author of Dishing With the Kitchen Virgin at The Fountainhead Bookstore in Hendersonville, NC  (08/13/2010)

Roger Rosenblatt, author of Making Toast at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 14 2010)

Ann Ross, author of Miss Julia Renews Her Vows at The Fountainhead Bookstore in Hendersonville, NC  (08/20/2010)

Rick Rothaker, author of BANKTOWN: THE RISE AND STRUGGLES OF CHARLOTTE'S BI at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/29/2010)

María Elvira Salazar, author of Si Dios contigo Quien Contra Ti? at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 13 2010)

Brandon Sanderson, author of Way of Kings at Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, NC  (9/7/2010)

Eileen Schwab, author of Promise Bridge at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/25/2010)


Lisa Shively, author of Gritslicker at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/15/2010)

Bill Sirmon, author of Tales of Litchfield Beach at Litchfield Books in Pawleys Island, SC  (09/17/2010)

Nicholas Sparks, author of Safe Haven at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (September 15 2010)

Susan Sparks, author of Laugh Your Way to Grace at Park Road Books in Charlotte, NC  (August 23 2010) and at Barnhill's in Winston-Salem, NC  (08/24/2010)

Ellie Taylor, author of Feeding the Kids: The Flexible, No-Battles, Health at Hub City Bookshop in Spartanburg, SC  (September 8 2010

James Tuten, author of Lowcountry Time and Tide at Litchfield Books in Pawleys Island, SC  (09/24/2010)

Jeffrey Wands, author of In Knock and the Door Will Open at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 20 2010)

Nancy Welch, author of A Touch of Humor: Recipes Seasoned with Southern H at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (August 20 2010)

Tonja Weimer, author of Thriving After Divorce: Transforming Your Life whe at Fiction Addiction in Greenville, SC  (09/29/2010)

Lauren Weisberger, author of Last Night at Chateau Marmont at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 19 2010)

Ann Greenleaf Wirtz, author of The Henderson County Curb Market: A Blue Ridge He at The Fountainhead Bookstore in Hendersonville, NC  (09/03/10)

John Woodin, author of City of Memory at Octavia Books in New Orleans, LA  (August 24 2010)

Stuart Woods, author of Santa Fe Edge at Eagle Eye Book Shop in Atlanta, GA  (September 22 2010)

Jill Zarin, author of Secrets of a Jewish Mother at Books & Books Inc in Coral Gables, FL  (August 20 2010)

Irene Ziegler, author of Ashes to Water at Muse Book Shop in Deland, FL  (08/21/2010)

Southern Traveling Authors Registration Service
Reader, meet writer: STARS authors on the road

The following authors are traveling this month and open to meeting with book clubs, talking to schools and participating in library programs. Visit the STARS directory at Authors Round the South for more information.


Hester Bass   Orlando, FL 11/19/2010

Biloxi, MS 12/2/2010

Ocean Springs, MS 11/6/2010

Chattanooga, TN  9/24/2010


Maggie Bishop   John C. Campbell Folk Schoo, GA l10/30/2011

Jamestown, NC 9/24/2010

Sugar Mountain, NC 10/9/2010

Valle Crucis, NC 10/16/2010

Galax, VA  9/11/2010


Marshall Chapman
   Frankfort, KY 11/13/2010

 Oxford, MS 11/4/2010

Hillsborough, NC 11/21/2010

Raleigh, NC 11/20/2010

Winston-Salem, NC 11/17/2010

Greenville, SC 11/18/2010

Spartanburg, SC 11/19/2010


Ellen Crosby
  Richmond, VA  8/12/2010 & 8/27/2010



Elizabeth O. Dulemba   Auburn, AL 10/8/2010

Charlotte, NC  9/24/2010


Jayne Jaudon Ferrer   Brasstown, NC 8/15/2010


Wayne Greenhaw   Amelia Island, FL 2/17/2011


Carolyn Haines   Hattiesburg, MS 8/19/2010

Oxford, MS 8/13/2010

Starkville, MS 8/12/2010

West Point, MS 8/12/2010

 

Batt Humphreys   Daytona, FL 9/24/2010


Peggy Millin  Lake Logan, NC 10/25/2010

Raleigh, NC 8/22/2010 & 9/11/2010


Pamela Bauer Mueller   Statesboro, GA 10/22/2010


Margaret Norton  Beaufort, NC 10/16/2010

Burlington, NC  9/18/2010

Greenville, NC 10/9/2010

Wilmington, NC  8/28/2010 & 9/11/2010

Winston-Salem, NC10/23/2010

Columbia, SC 10/30/2010


Scott Owens   Raleigh, NC 9/26/2010


Jack Riggs  Sun City/Hilton Head, SC  8/19/2010


Donny Bailey Seagraves   
Athens, GA 10/14/2010

Decatur, GA 9/3/2010

The Southern Indie Lit Crossword Puzzle Book

Ten years of great southern lit for $9.95!

How well do you know your Southern lit? We dare you to use a pen on these crossword puzzles, each inspired by one of the winning titles of the SIBA Book Award, honoring ten years of the very best in Southern literature as chosen by the people who would know...Southern Independent Booksellers! A great gift for your book club, for puzzle-lovers, and anyone who loves Southern literature.

$9.95 paperback. Available at Southern Indie Bookstores.

Play a sample puzzle online!


How has To Kill a Mockingbird affected you?  Share your story on Twitter #TKAMLiterary Gossip & News:


To Kill a Mockingbird—it would not be the same with dolphins.

The discussions and commentary engendered by the fiftieth anniversary of To Kill a Mockingbird (book, and naturally therefore, movie) continue to appear in even the most unlikely places, including a Web site devoted to the history of closets and clothes hangers which waxes eloquote on the appearance of the chifferobe in Southern literature. It is, her ladyship confesses, an aspect of southern literary analysis that she has hitherto overlooked.

An acquaintance—who shall remain nameless—once complained to her ladyship that Harper Lee’s singular novel was not singular at all, but a pallid story not worthy of its acclaim. “You could replace the black people with dolphins, and it wouldn’t make any difference,” was her opinion. Her ladyship, the editor cannot agree. She thinks To Kill a Mockingbird would make no sense at all if it were about dolphins. She also continues to believe that it is the one book that everyone –man, woman, child, even dolphin if they are literate—should read.

Mr. Pat Conroy is not afraid of e-Books

Earlier this month a literary agency of Goliath-stature caused a bit of a word-storm when it announced that it was going into the e-book publishing business (which alarmed writers) and that it would publish eBooks of the authors it represented to be made available exclusively  on the Amazon Kindle e-Reader (which alarmed everyone who didn’t own one). One Southern bookseller had some rather pithy things to say about that. http://www.squarebooks.com/welcome-wylie-world

It is hardly possible these days to ask someone what they are reading without it leading into a discussion of eBooks and the inevitably dismal fate of publishing. But some people—even some Southerners—appear more sanguine. Such as the young man who discovered that a two-volume reference work on Southern writers written by his grandfather is available in eBook form. Of course, there was a slight drawback—“ One look at the text made me realize this book would be almost impossible to read.” There are formatting issues, apparently, which digitizing books from the early 1900s brings to the fore.  Google, who did the digitizing, seems supremely indifferent.

Another man not concerned with the rising tide of eBooks is Mr. Pat Conroy, who notes that “"I imagine there will be paper books, at least until people like me die out," he says. "But I don't think there's any reason to worry about it.”

New Stories from the South 2010New Southern writers in the news:

Algonquin Books at Chapel Hill is profiled in the Miami Herald, while elsewhere a reviewer  discusses the latest edition of New Stories from the South and is inspired to ask:  is Southern literature going the way of the slamming screen door?

Michael Knight (not the eighties television star who had the talking car):  http://www.metropulse.com/news/2010/aug/04/knoxville-author-michael-knight-reaches-turning-po/

The TypistTom Franklin: http://thereadablefeast.blogspot.com/2010/08/crooked-letter-crooked-letter.html

John Fenton: http://www.clarksvilleonline.com/2010/08/10/fenton-johnson-writer-from-kentucky/

Old Southern Writers also in the news:

Flannery O’Connor:“The Southern writer can out-write anybody in the country because he has the Bible, and a little history.” http://online.worldmag.com/2010/08/03/sorting-our-inheritance/

Crooked Letter, Crooked LetterWilliam Faulker: Faulkner's lectures are now available online for anyone who decided to skip his class.http://faulkner.lib.virginia.edu/

John Kennedy Toole: http://www.artscriticatl.com/2010/08/get-set-for-the-falstaff-of-southern-fiction-the-slovenly-hero-of-a-confederacy-of-dunces-at-theatrical-outfit/ Atlanta theatrical legend Tom Key has adapted “Dunces” for a world premiere production at Theatrical Outfit August 11 through September 5. Is Ignatius J. Reilly the new Southern Falstaff?
Her ladyship can see it.

And other literary news of a gossipy, front-porch nature:

Anne Rice leaves the Church: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/herocomplex/2010/08/anne-rice-leaves-christianity-with-a-kind-of-confusion-a-toxic-anger.html Her ladyship is too ladylike to shrug her shoulders, but if she wasn’t, she would.

Actress Patricia Neal has passed away and her ladyship is heartily sorry to hear it.  http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/38618974/ns/today-entertainment/

The poet Chris Abani is banned from Florida school’s summer reading list: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2010/08/chris-abani-banned-from-florida-schools-summer-reading-list

Bookstore profiles:

Next Chapter Bookstore Gainesville, GA: Next Chapter Book Store, inside Main Street Market, will be run by young adult men with disabilities who live together in a house sponsored by a non-profit called Our Neighbor.

Trading Pages opens in Spartanburg, SC.

New owners at Blue Ridge Books in Waynesville, NC


A Turn in the SouthLady Banks’ Commonplace Book

The party was “Southern” in its motifs. A Confederate flag fluttered in the sunlight in the rough field between the woods. A skinned pig, fixed in the posture of a hurdler, had been roasting all day, held on poles a little to one side of slow-burning hardwood logs. (On a table were more contemporary fast foods and dips and things in waxed paper.) And a band played bluegrass music from the wooden hut. Flag, pig, music: things from the past. The musical instruments were big, the music simple and repetitive. I was told that it was the words of the songs that mattered. The accents were not easy for me to follow; but the effect, especially from a little distance, of the unamplifieid music and singing in that enclosed green place was pleasant.

Our hostess said, “Indians might have lived here.”

With that  idea of being in the American wilderness, I felt a chill, thinking of them in this green land with its protective slopes, its shade, and rivers. Later I learned the ground was full of flint arrowheads.

--VS Naipaul, A Turn in the South (Vintage, 1990)

 


Author 2 Author: Sam McLeod's Big Appetite
an Interview with Karen Spears Zacharias

Sam and Karen

Ham biscuits cause Sam McLeod to go weak in the knees. So does his mama’s meat loaf, fried chicken done right, mac-and-cheese with oysters, and pie of any sort, although chess pie is his favorite. Like a lot of southern folks, Sam McLeod has rarely met a meal he didn’t like.

Sam gives the skinny on several of his all-time favorite dishes in his uproariously funny book, Big Appetite: My Southern-Fried Search for the Meaning of Life. It’s a memoir gone wild and seasoned with dash of southern cuisine.

Imagine if the Little Rascals had invited Will Ferrell to be a member of their gang. Those are the kinds of romps that Sam takes the reader on as he revisits the Nashville neighborhood of his youth.

Sam doesn’t live in Nashville any more. He lives 30 miles up yonder from here, in a sweet little spot that could pass for a holler if the West had hollers but it doesn’t. It has wide open spaces and big blue skies.

How two southerners found their way West and became writers is one of the tales Sam McLeod and Karen Spears Zacharias swapped at Detour Farm, the McLeod’s 160-acre farmstead, a few miles due west of Walla Walla, Washington.

Big AppetiteBig Appetite has been selected by the Southern Independent Booksellers Association as an OKRA book pick. But like his Aunt Wiese’s strawberry pie, this book is bound to be a favorite with readers on both sides of the country.

Karen: When you were growing up in Nashville, did you think you’d grow up to be a writer?

Sam: Yes. I’ve thought about writing this book since I was 16. I’d go to bed thinking about these stories. I’d wake up in the middle of the night thinking about these stories. The stories grew in importance and I would embellish them. I’d wake up at 3 in the morning just to write them down.

Karen: Where did you go to college?

Sam: University of Virginia. (Sam met his bride Annie at UVA. She is a Richmond native. They’ve been married 35 years.) I majored in English and studied under Irby Cauthen. I was thinking about going to graduate school and went to his office to ask if he would write a letter of reference. He leaned across the desk and asked, “Have you ever considered banking?” Irby knew me pretty well. I think he realized that teaching English was not my calling.

Karen: You went into banking?

Sam: Not right away. I worked as a Haberdasher – a thread salesman – for a year. I took a job in banking and we moved to Chicago for three years. We loved Chicago – we were young and had two incomes – but the winters were brutal. That first winter we were there they got the most snow in Chicago’s history. The next was the coldest in history. That third year we moved back to Virginia and I enrolled in law school at Washington & Lee.

(Sam worked as a corporate attorney for 10 years. It was a job that gave him plenty of opportunity to fine tune his writing skills.) I was writing briefs and business plans and letters. Anything that needs to be written was passed off to me.

Karen: How did you end up out West?

Sam: I thought I’d try my hand as a Venture Capitalist. The job required me to be in Seattle. I’d fly to Seattle on Monday and back to Virginia on Friday.

(That routine lasted until the couple’s three daughters reached high school age, then Annie suggested that maybe they ought to make the move to Seattle.)

Karen: How did your family react when you told them you were leaving Virginia for Seattle? Are they praying for your salvation?

Sam: Yes. They think we’re crazy. They can’t figure out why in the world we’d want to live way out here. They keep asking when I’m going to come home. But by home, they don’t mean Richmond, or even Nashville – they mean Jackson, Tennessee – the original homestead.

Karen: Seattle is a long way from Richmond. People who haven’t made the move don’t appreciate the culture shock of such a move. Did you experience any of that?

Sam: At first it was like moving to a foreign country where they spoke English. It is a different world. But in Virginia we’d been doing the cocktail party scene with the same set of people for years. They were good people but they were lawyers or a spouse of a lawyer. I remember one of our first dinner parties in Seattle there was the gardener, a cabinet-maker, the fellow who coached a soccer team. People from all walks of life. People who weren’t lawyers.

Karen: So how did you get to Walla Walla from Seattle?

Sam: We were in Seattle with the house on the lake, all the cars, TVs and things that we’d been taught that if we lived the right way we’d have. Our girls were grown and gone. There we were, in our 50s, staring out on the lake one day, and we realized that even though we had everything we’d worked for, it didn’t make us happy.

We’d vacationed in Montana for 20 years. Every time I went to Montana I felt like I could breathe. All those years I spent working, flying to and from Virginia, I would dream about living in a cabin in Montana somewhere.

Our middle daughter was in college in Walla Walla at that time. During trips over to visit her, we’d find time to tool around town. We realized that Walla Walla was a lot like Montana. It had the wide open sky, the mountains in the distance, a vibrant downtown and good medical care for our doddering years.

It was that move – to a whole new way of life – that enticed Steve Johnson to adopt a pen name – Samuel Archibald McLeod, a respectful nod to Mark Twain – and to refer to his wife Neal by her chosen moniker, Annie.

Karen: What do people around here call you, Sam or Steve?

Sam: It can get confusing. I get called both names.

Karen: So what do you grow here?

Sam (laughing): It’s supposed to be natural grasses and shrubs for wildlife but it’s mostly weeds. For the past 50 years this has been a cattle ranch. They didn’t worry about the weeds. They’d put the cattle out to graze.  We took the cattle off, so the weeds are only 50 years deep.

Detour Farm

Some famous people have passed through the house that Sam and Annie built to resemble the beloved Fish Camp homes of the South. Everyone who enters is encouraged to sign the rough-hewn beam that separates the kitchen from the living room. Diane Rehm’s name is one of dozens scribbled there. Bright paintings by local artists adorn the walls. Colorful throws made from the fleece of alpacas that roam the north side of the farm are tossed on chairs. There’s even an outdoor shower that Annie had to fight for tooth and nail. The builder could not believe that anyone really wanted an outdoor shower.

And there’s that barn, the one where Sam stripped down to his nether regions and climbed on the scale used to weigh the farm animals, and groaned. But you can read more about that in the book.

This is not his first book. Sam self-published a trilogy about his bumbling experiences as the big-city fella come to roost in the small-town. Welcome To Walla Walla, Bottled Walla and Blue Walla, were big hits with the locals. The books are carried by the various wineries and eateries about town. Sam writes a popular column for the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin and from time to time, he performs in a show View from the Porch, modeled after Prairie Home Companion. One thing led to another and soon enough, New York came a’calling. Big Appetite is published by Simon Schuster and it is being promoted in Waffle Houses nationwide.

Karen: What’s the connection to Waffle Houses? How’d you get them to promote you?

Sam: My Uncle Joe opened the first Waffle House in the 1950s.

Karen: So you had a pretty idyllic childhood? That’s where you draw your stories from?

Sam: My early life was a bed of roses. I write about all the unusual characters in our neighborhood but in a nice way.

Karen: You call your mother Coco? Not Mama or Mother?

Sam: She wanted to be called Coco. That was her name. I think she liked being called something different than all the other moms. She is the driving force of the book, of course.

Karen: So what does Coco think of this book?

Sam (laughing again): She called me when she got a copy and asked, ‘Who is this kid on the cover?’ I said I didn’t know. Coco said, ‘Well, thank God they found this photo. This kid is way cuter than you ever were!’  She couldn’t wait to take it to the beauty parlor to show to all her friends.

Karen: So did you find the meaning of life while writing this book?

Sam (blue eyes moist): The creative process has opened up a whole new community of people to me. I spent a great deal of my life so busy I wasn’t paying attention. I was leading a helter-skelter life. I missed a lot because of that. I never slowed down long enough to hear the characters speak to me the way they had when I was younger. Moving to Walla Walla and writing has enabled me to reconnect with people and discover community again. I found my muse here.

Karen: Readers everywhere are going to be delighted about that. To find out more about this engaging storyteller or to schedule Sam for an event go to sammcleod.net or email sam@detourfarm.com

Dear IRS: Sam gave me a copy of his book.  I gave him a copy of my book. Oh. And Annie gave me a dozen of the prettiest eggs I ever did see.

Eat your heart out.


From the Blogs

{The Authors}

Nancy Pate: Unlike Carl Hiaasen, who uses Day-Glo colors in his almost-black comedies of Florida, John Brandon goes for the dark side of the palette in his second novel, Citrus County. This disquieting tale of adolescent crimes of the heart and worse plays out in a off-the-road, middle-of-nowhere world of muddy browns and greens, mosquitoes, mushrooms and mildew. http://patebooks.wordpress.com/2010/08/04/off-the-road/

A Good Blog is Hard to Find: When I made the decision to quit teaching and be a fulltime writer, I wondered if I’d have a problem staying at home by myself, talking to no one except the dog. Would I lose all my social skills? Would I end up being one of those people muttering to themselves, slapping at imaginary flies, and making homemade bombs in my basement? http://southernauthors.blogspot.com/2010/08/writers-get-by-with-little-help-from.html

Gunpowder Cowboy Boots and Mascara: The Chicago Tribune recently allowed three short paragraphs to a story about a police raid in which they confiscated 450 pounds of dried marijuana and 600 live plants. They also found 30 raccoon hides in the freezer. I will bet you a hundred dollars you can't find a Southerner anywhere on the editorial staff of that paper because had that happened below the Mason-Dixon, them boys would have been front page, above the fold.
http://workingtitlefarm.blogspot.com/2010/07/king-of-wild-frontier.html


{The Booksellers}

A Reading Life:  Carol is a resourceful woman motivated by the discovery that, as happily married as they are and have been for thirty-four  years, retirement has shown that the house can be a wee bit small when the two people in it have nothing to do. Frugal by nature and by necessity, she is a dedicated library-goer and has been making her way through the local branch mystery section slowly but systematically.

So I was a little surprised to hear her say, when last we spoke, that she had just come back from the bookstore. “What did you get?” I asked, always curious about the books my friends are buying. “Oh, Nicki,” she laughed, “I have to tell you the story of this book.”

http://www.bibliobuffet.com/a-reading-life-columns-193/1336-looking-for-a-book-a-parable-080110

Burry Bookstore: It's amazing to watch Clay Rice and see what flows from the turn of his hand, the clip of his scissors, and the extraordinary way he produces his art.  If you haven't seen him, you've missed out on a unique and gifted artist.   Clay Rice Video  http://burrybookstore.blogspot.com/2010/08/clay-rice-is-amazing.html

Lincoln’s Loft: WOW Just finished "The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove" by Susan Gregg Gilmore. Wonderful couldn't put it down. If you ever wanted a close up look at the race issue in the south this is very revealing. Great book would (will) recommend it to customers.http://lincolnsloft.blogspot.com/

Pulpwood Queen: The Pulpwood Queen has taken the baton, and takes over A Good Blog Is Hard to Find. As of Monday, I indeed will have the torch, baton, whatever, passed on to me of continuing this incredible venture of sharing the BEST of southern authors.  Karin will be guiding me through this transition period and I pray we have a smooth and even journey as we showcase all your invaluable advice, stories, and talents. But first, many of you may ask, "Kathy, who?"  http://southernauthors.blogspot.com/2010/08/pulpwood-queen-grabs-baton-from-author.html

Regulator:   3) The Kindle flunked out of Princeton. Last year, Princeton gave free Kindles to students in three undergraduate courses, pre-loaded with the required reading. The response of the students was pretty much universally negative… http://regulatorbookshop.blogspot.com/2010/08/five-things-jeff-bezos-doesnt-want-you.html

Page 854:  Meanwhile, down at Sloppy Joe's bar in Key West, Florida, the locals have been celebrating summer with their annual event honoring one of Sloppy Joe's most famous patrons: "Hemingway Days." The festivities included fiction readings, a play, a fishing tournament and the world-famous Ernest Hemingway look-alike contest. Congratulations to this year's winner, Charles Bicht, who somehow was judged to look a bit more like Papa Hemingway than 123 other white-bearded guys dressed in khaki fishing outfits. http://accentonbooks.blogspot.com/2010/08/weiner-papa.html

Square Books:Amazon manufactures a reading device, the “kindle,” which requires its owners to buy digital merchandise exclusively from Amazon – a bit like our selling you books that you could read only by using the bedside lamp you must also purchase from us.  And this would be the only way you could read these books.  Wylie’s authors’ electronic books will be available only via the kindle, only via Amazon, a soiling of first amendment principles that many of the agency’s authors, such as Arthur Miller and Salman Rushdie, have fought so hard to protect. http://www.squarebooks.com/welcome-wylie-world


Read This!: recommended by your neighborhood southern booksellers

bookstores, twittering.

Her ladyship, the editor has noticed a very great rise in the number of bookstores on Twitter. Twitter, it seems, has become the perfect online incarnation of “You’ve got to read this!” – in the end, the only phrase that can really sell a book. And, at 76 characters, still only half the space of your average “tweet.”

Below are the books that booksellers are, well, a-twitter about. Reproduced in all their original text-speak, but with her ladyship’s translations wherever she deemed it necessary, and in defense of the English language, which she hates to see so mangled:

@regbook: New paperback of the day? "Cold: Adventures in the World's Frozen Places." http://www.regulatorbookshop.com/book/9780316042925

@BookExchangeME: Did you know that the author Stieg Larsson passed away in 2004 from a heart attack? Before his books were... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stieg_Larsson

@SPbooksandgifts: 4 of 5 stars to Getting to Happy by Terry McMillan http://www.goodreads.com/mobile/review/show/110127905   

@little_prof: New Macmillan catalogs arrived today with the listing for the next Joe Ledger book by @JonathanMaberry. Happy dance ensued

@octaviabooks: Law professor Robert Verchick timely book on environmental protections http://www.loyno.edu/news/story/2010/7/19/2174

@seizethebook: Check out this great article in the Metro Pulse about Michael Knight. He will be at Carpe Librum on 8/21. http://www.metropulse.com/news/2010/aug/04/knoxville-author-michael-knight-reaches-turning-po/

@FountainBkStore: Can I tweet a #SIBA Book Award nominee? @ladybanks are you watching? Author of DRAGONBREATH lives in NC & I lurve it! http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780803733633   

Now here is all that again, in grammatically correct, properly-spelled, comprehensible English:

The Regulator Bookshop, in deference to the heat of a Southern August, is recommending a book about traveling to very, very cold places. The people at The Book Exchange of Marietta, Georgia, have discovered that the bestselling author of The Girl Who…books died of a heart attack several years ago. Simple Pleasures Books and Gifts in Ashland, VA, really liked Terry McMillan’s new novel, and pointed to their review at Good Reads, which they seem to have written on their iPhone. Little Professor in Homewood, AL found out that Jonathan Maberry will have a new book out this fall, and was inspired to do a little jig. (No YouTube video of the latter, just yet). Octavia Books in New Orleans is recommending Facing Catastrophe, a new book from Loyola Press on environmental protection. The women at Carpe Librum in Knoxville, TN are looking forward to a visit from Michael Knight (once again, not the actor who had the talking car). And Fountain Bookstore “lurved” a book called Dragonbreath, and shouted so from the rooftops of Twitterland, asking if her ladyship was listening.

She was.Okra Picks

Summer 2010 Okra Picks

Fiction

Backseat Saints By Accident Countdown Eternal Ones The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove On Folly Beach The Secret Child

Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson
Grand Central Publishing, June 2010
9780446582346 24.99

By Accident by Susan Kelly
Pegasus Books, May 2010
9781605980881 24.00

Countdown by Deborah Wiles
Scholastic Press, May 2010
9780545106054 $17.99

The Eternal Ones by Kirsten Miller         
Razorbill, August 2010
9781595143082 17.99

The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove by Susan Gregg Gilmore     
Shaye Areheart Books, August 2010
9780307395030 23.00

On Folly Beach by Karen White                
New American Library, May 2010
9780451229212 15.00

The Secret Child by Marti Healy
Design Group Press, June 2010
9780979127779 24.95

Nonfiction

Big Appetite The Blueberry Years   Food, Folklore, and Art of Lowcountry Cooking Freedom Summer Oraien Catledge

Big Appetite: My Southern-Fried Search for theMeaning of Life by Sam McLeod
Touchstone Books, June 2010
9781439188163 23.00

The Blueberry Years: A Memoir of Farm and Family by Jim  Minick        
Thomas Dunne Books , August 2010
9780312571429 27.99

The Food, Folklore, and Art of Lowcountry Cooking: A Celebration of the Foods, History, and Romance Handed Down from England, Africa, the Caribbean,France by Joseph Earl Dabney
Cumberland House Publishing, May 2010
9781402230981 29.99

Freedom Summer: The Savage Season That Made Mississippi Burn and Made America a Democracy by Bruce Watson                 
Viking Books, June 2010
9780670021703 27.95

Oraien Catledge: Photographs by Oraien E Catledge,    
University Press of Mississippi , August 2010 
9781604735000 35.00


Lady Banks’ Bookshelf

Lady Banks



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