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Rerun: Hanley Reviews Winslow & Mayhew

Saturday Review: “People As Part, Community As Sum” a review by John Hanley
De’Shawn Charles Winslow. In West Mills. (2019)
Anna Jean Mayhew. Tomorrow’s Bread. (2019)
“… while In West Mills asks us to examine how a community can be a foundation for its inhabitants, Tomorrow’s Bread asks us what happens when that foundation is stripped away,”

Endings or Beginnings? The Lost Colony Drama Remains

Friday from the Archives: “into the vast unknown”? The Changing Ending of Paul Green’s The Lost Colony By E. Thomson Shields, Jr. from NCLR Issue 27 (2018)

It’s the unofficial start of summer, which means one of North Carolina’s most well-known stories and summer adventures is getting started for the season. The outdoor symphonic drama The Lost Colony has been important to several North Carolina industries over the years.

Rerun: Huener on McFee & Bathanti

Saturday Review: “Spreading Awe: Childhood and Heritage in New Poetry” a review by Sarah Huener
Joseph Bathanti. The 13th Sunday after Pentecost. 2017.
Michael McFee. We Were Once Here. 2017.
“These are two poets with distinctive voices, voices that observe their youth, but which are also wiser than the past selves we meet within their pages.”

Bourbon and Branch Water: Hardy’s “Wedding Belles”

Friday from the Archives: “Wedding Belles” fiction by Melissa Hardy from NCLR Issue 12 (2003)

Clad in a flame azalea organdy leftover bridesmaid dress from her older sister’s wedding, Julia Snow (of the Chapel Hill Snows) is attending her college roommate Muffin’s wedding in Charlotte. Julia thought she, like Muffin, like her sisters, like many other women of her time, would have gotten an MRS degree along with her Music BA. As it turns out, she didn’t and is now pondering what, and who, her future holds.

Rerun: Neal reviews Joy & Lucas

Saturday Review: “Tallying the Cost of Addiction in Appalchia:” a review by Dale Neal
David Joy. When These Mountains Burn. 2020.
Meagan Lucas. Songbirds & Stray Dogs. 2019.
In a serendipitous event, both David Joy and Meagan Lucas, both writers living in the NC mountains, have new books out this year AND were reviewed together for their last books.

Hallberg’s “City on Fire” Makes Jump to Television

Friday from the Archives: “Make Believe with Utter Conviction: An Interview With Garth Risk Hallberg” by Brian Glover from NCLR Issue 24 (2017) “Brian Glover interviewed Hallberg during his novel book tour in 2015. Glover wrote, “By any measure, Garth Risk Hallberg’s novel City on Fire was one of the major literary events of 2015…”

Rerun: Bennett reviews Smith & McCorkle

Saturday Review Rerun: Lee Smith’s last novel, Blue Marlin, was reviewed by Barbara Bennett in NCLR Online 2021. Bennett calls Blue Marlin a classic “tale of initiation” of teen Jenny, loosely based on Smith’s own childhood adventure to Key West.