NCLR 2008

The “Inimitable Music” of Eastern North Carolina 
an essay by Michael Parker
photography by Joshua Tyler Rivenbark

Men Like White Elephants
a short story
by Lawrence Naumoff
illustrated by Kyle T. Webster

Desecration 
a short story by Chris Brown
illustrated by Kyle T. Webster

Eggcorns
a poem by Catherine Carter
art by Paul Hartley

By Numbers and Oh Man
two poems by Michael McFee
art by Carol Lee Thompson

Regarding the State Dog 
a poem by Martha Owens
art by Louis St. Lewis

Ruins of Time
an essay by Jerry Leath Mills
art by Mike Hoyt

Dog Drama
an essay by Jennifer McGaha
art by Guy Smalley

Southwest Humor’s Frontier Preacher: Hardin E. Taliaferro and Sketches from Fisher’s River
by Gretchen Martin

Hardin Taliaferro, the Gentlest of Southwestern Humorists 
by Jennings Mace

Body Language and Satiric Portraits in Thomas Wolfe’s The Party at Jack’s
by John Idol, Jr.

A “love of hopeless comedy”: The Humor of Personal and Cultural Crisis in Allan Gurganus’s Plays Well With Others
by Gary Richards

Not Always a “Piece of Cake”: Harrowing Humor in the Poetry of Kathryn Stripling Byer 
an interview by James Smith

Piece of Cake and Glorified, 
two poems by Kathryn Stripling Byer

Character, Myth, and the Southern Voice: We’re Not in Hee-Haw Any More 
a review by Felicia Mitchell
art by Henryk Fantazos

The World that Kudzu Made: Working with Doug Marlette, 1993-2007
by Bland Simpson
art by Doug Marlette

Safety Patrol Song
a song by Clyde Edgerton

Nativity, Caucasian
a story by Allan Gurganus

Some Strategies for Weathering This Storm of Approval
an essay by Barry Saunders

The Ship Shape
an essay by David Sedaris

Whose Idea Was This?
a song by the Coastal Cohorts, Bland Simpson, Jim Wann, and Don Dixon

Baloney Bacon and Beer
a song by Clyde Edgerton

Hidden Meanings, Treatment of Time, Supreme Irony, and Life Experiences in the Song “Ain’t Gonna Bump No More No Big Fat Woman” 
a story by Michael Parker

Older People in Cars, from Lunch at the Piccadilly
an excerpt by Clyde Edgerton

Your Husband Is Cheating on Us
a story by Jill McCorkle

Sound Side
a song by the Coastal Cohorts, Bland Simpson, Jim Wann, and Don Dixon

Vision 
a short story by Liza Wieland
art by J. Chris Wilson

Pompey’s Knob 
a poem by Susan Meyers
art by A.R. Ammons

“getting dirty and working hard to find the story”: An Interview with Kerry Madden 
by Angela Leeper

Madden’s Mountain Music 
a review of Kerry Madden’s trilogy by Sara K. Day

“finding your voice…[is] like falling in love: when it happens, you know it”: An Interview with Louise Shivers
by Maryscot Mullins

Shelton Laurel 
an essay by Ron Rash

Leaving Cold Harbor 
a novel excerpt by Louise Shivers

“a wanderer on the earth” and “a son of the community”: Place and the Question of Queers in the Rural Souths of Lee Smith and Randall Kenan 
by Harry Thomas

Geography for Writers
an essay by Lee Zacharias

Distance, the 2007 Doris Betts Prize story
by Thomas Wolf
art by Noyes Capehart

Five Is Red, the 2007 Betts 2nd place story
by Gregg Cusick
art by Richard Garrison
Hear Gregg read from the story here.

Myfanwy and the Gargoyle
a poem by Brenda Mann Hammack
art by Duy Huynh

Poem for Buck Owens and Coal Twilight 
two poems by Frederick Foote
art by Duy Huynh

The River’s Embrace 
a short story by Michael Chitwood
art by Richard Stenhouse

Mississippiensis and the Happiness of Thoreau 
an essay by Chris Morgan
photography by Gayle Tustin

Great Ecology Tour 
an essay by Laura L. Mays Hoopes
art by Joan Mansfield

2-East at Midnight 
a poem by Marty Silverthorne
art by David Terry

Three Optimists 
a review of three poetry collections
by Brooke Horvath

Life as We Experience It 
a review of five poetry collections
by Al Maginnes

Basketball and Other Matters of Transcendent Importance 
a review of two memoirs
by James Kirkland

Justice Systems, Haunting and Broken 
a review of two novels
by Rebecca Godwin

Rural and Urban Rites of Passage 
a review of two YA Novels
by Laureen Tedesco

Grace, Myth, and Invention 
a review of three novels
by L. A. Heberlein

NC Newsbriefs 
by Susan Winders Moses

Writing for the Reader
a review of Louise Hawes’s new short story collection
by Sally F. Lawrence

Three New Books on Thomas Wolfe 
by Wiley Cash

NCLR Founders Awarded for “Literary Inspiration” 
remarks by Margaret D. Bauer

Happy Trails
a review of a new North Carolina literary reference
by Lorraine Hale Robinson