Category: Southern Fiction

  • Faded dreams and vanished worlds

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson THE SWEET TASTE OF MUSCADINES. By Pamela Terry. Ballantine Books. 288 pages. $27. Pamela Terry has a winner in “The Sweet Taste of Muscadines,” her debut novel. The book is billed as a Southern novel, and it is – in the best sense of that descriptive. The geography is right:…

  • In the swamps, Burke takes it up a notch

    Bob Moyer has been busy, moving to a new home and doing all the other things Bob Moyer does. Including reading. Now, at last, he’s found time again to write some book reviews and share his literary finds with us. Thank goodness. Reviewed by Robert P.  Moyer A PRIVATE CATHEDRAL: A Dave Robicheaux Novel. By…

  • All aboard for Whistle Stop!

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson THE WONDER BOY OF WHISTLE STOP. By Fannie Flagg. Random House Audio. Read by the author. 8 hours; 7 compact discs. $40. Also available in hardback from Random House. You are in for a treat. Need an antidote to COVID, the election and all the other things 2020 has thrown…

  • A beach read, and more

    I’ve followed Kristy Woodson Harvey’s writing career from the beginning, and I’ve enjoyed every step of the journey. Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson FEELS LIKE FALLING. By Kristy Woodson Harvey. Gallery Books, Simon & Schuster. 384 pages. $16.99, paperback. Whether you’re heading to one of the recently re-opened beaches or passing the time at home,…

  • The never-ending war

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson THE RECKONING. By John Grisham. Random House Audio. 18 hours; 15 CDs. Read by Michael Beck. $45. Also available in print from Doubleday. As John Grisham’s latest novel opens, Pete Banning, a highly decorated World War II hero, family man and scion of a respected cotton-farming family in northern Mississippi,…

  • A North Carolina marvel

    Bob Moyer has visited my territory, reviewing a new novel set in coastal North Carolina. I’m glad he did. I’m eager to read this one myself. Now if we could just get Bob to come visit these marshes in person… Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. By Delia Owens. G. P. Putnam’s…

  • Battling demons

    Bob Moyer reviews the latest in a long-running and outstanding mystery series. Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer ROBICHEAUX. By James Lee Burke. Simon and Schuster. 445 pages. $27.99. Year by year, book by book, Deputy Sherriff Dave Robicheaux sees more of the Confederate ghosts that appear out of the mist around his beloved New Iberia,…

  • Dark corners in the heart of North Carolina

    Bob Moyer reviews the latest thriller by John Hart, a fine North Carolina author. I scooped Bob by a few months: You can see my review of the same book that ran May 8 in the Greensboro News & Record here: http://www.greensboro.com/go_triad/arts/books/hart-s-thriller-redemption-road-is-well-worth-the-wait/article_ae13edaa-bd4d-5e40-a496-51957f15bfd1.html Fortunately, Bob and I agree in our praise of the novel. Reviewed by…

  • History is what we make it

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson I approached this book with hope but also some trepidation, having loved The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society so much that I read it in print AND listened to it as an audio book. Annie Barrows co-wrote that wonderful book with her aunt, Mary Ann Shaffer. As its…

  • Wacky and oh, so true

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson Understandably, when newspaper reporters try writing fiction, they’re likely to have a newspaper reporter as a major character. Stephen Roth, who spent 12 years in the trenches as a reporter for newspapers in Missouri and Florida, gives us a good one in Pete Schaefer, an aspiring novelist who’s stuck in…