Cracker Gothic


Book Description

PRAISE FOR Wanda Duncan: "In Cracker Gothic, Wanda Duncan writes about the intersections between family and place with precision, wit, and loving detail. Capturing moments that are at times humorous and at other times heartbreaking, Duncan makes spending time in the Florida swamp an unexpected, lyrical pleasure." - Aimee Mepham, author of "Raving Ones"




Animal Crackers


Book Description

When her grandmother starts forgetting things, has to go into a nursing home and then dies, a young girl tries to remember the good times they had shared.




Florida Frenzy


Book Description

"Fourteen essays and articles and three short stories that will hit you right between the eyes. Crews writing is informed by a deep love of language, literature, nature, blood sports, and his own kind of people--namely rural, southern, hard-drinking, honest-measure hell-raisers. We are all lucky to have him to tell us about cockfighting, dogfighting, mending an injured hawk, becoming a great jockey, poaching gators, and taking ourselves much too seriously"--Chicago Tribune "The author's gifts include an elegant and easy style, a knack for telling a good story, and a wry and riotous sense of humor. . . . Unforgettable characters whose preoccupations evoke such memorable detail. Despite the concreteness of his descriptions, his sports cronies and the bar rats he encounters take on a universality in his graceful prose."--Newsday In this collection of fiction and essays, Crews focuses on the people and places of Florida--full of natural wonders and other, grimier delights that make perfect grist for his forceful style, Southern Gothic sensibilities, and rowdy sense of humor. From poaching gators, to the Gatornationals, to cockfighting--a must-have collection for Harry Crews fans new and old.




Stars of Alabama


Book Description

In this heartfelt tale about enduring hope amid the suffering of the Great Depression, Sean Dietrich—also known as Sean of the South—weaves together a tale featuring a cast of characters ranging from a child preacher, a teenage healer, and two migrant workers who give everything they have for their chosen family. When fifteen-year-old Marigold becomes pregnant during the Great Depression, she is rejected by her family and forced to fend for herself. She is arrested while trying to steal food and loses her baby in the forest, turning her whole world upside down. She’s even more distraught upon discovering she has an inexplicable power to heal, making her a sought-after local legend. Meanwhile, middle-aged migrant workers Vern and Paul discover a violet-eyed baby abandoned in the woods and take it upon themselves to care for her. The men continue their search for work and soon pair up with a poverty-stricken widow, plus her two children, and the misfit family begins taking care of each other. As survival brings this chosen family together, a young boy finds himself without a friend to his name as the dust storms rage across Kansas. Fourteen-year-old Coot, a child preacher, is on the run from his abusive tent-revival pastor father with thousands of stolen dollars—and the only thing he’s sure of is that Mobile, Alabama, is his destination. In a sweeping saga with a looming second world war, these stories intertwine in surprising ways, reminding us that when the dust clears, we can still see the stars. Stand-alone Southern historical fiction set during the Great Depression Book length: approximately 98,000 words Includes discussion questions for book clubs Also by Sean Dietrich: The Incredible Winston Browne




Classic Cracker


Book Description

Winner of the 1993 LoPresti Award for excellence in art publishing Cracker homes take the best advantage of the climate and terrain of Florida. This book provides a history of Florida wood-frame architecture, from the simplest "single-pen" homesteads to the latest homes at Seaside, and includes several floor plans for new adaptations of classic Cracker architecture. Learn about the double-pen house, the classic dogtrot, the four-square Georgian, the Cracker townhouse, and much more with this exploration of Florida's orginal architecture. Includes several floor plans for new adaptations of classic Cracker architecture.




Sombrero Fallout


Book Description

A heartbroken American writer starts a story about an ice-cold sombrero that falls inexplicably from the sky and lands in the centre of a small Southwest town. Devastated by the departure of his gorgeous Japanese girlfriend, he cannot concentrate on his writing and in frustration he throws away his beginning. But as the man searches through his apartment for strands of his lost love's hair, the discarded story in the wastepaper basket - through some kind of elaborate origami - carries on without him. Arguments over the sombrero begin, one thing leads to another and before long all hell breaks loose in the normally sleep town. Brautigan's fertile imagination twists and pulls at the ensuing chaos to come up with a tender, moving, surreal and incredibly funny tale that is told by a writer at the very peak of his creative powers.




Ride South Until the Sawgrass


Book Description

From the moment Nat Quinto and his wife Lucy set foot in the Florida Territory, they can't seem to steer clear of Jake Primrose, a rancher whose schemes to increase his already plentiful wealth ensnare everyone around him. Between Primrose's greed and the brutal conflicts brewing in the Territory surrounding them, will the Quinto family be able to stay true to themselves? In four tales, the paths of the Primrose and Quinto families cross, separate, and inevitably intertwine in this virtuosic debut set during the tumultuous years of the Florida Territory's Second Seminole War and early statehood.




Junior Ray


Book Description

Selected as a Top Ten Sensational Debut Novel by Barnes and Noble This provocative novel takes the reader on a wild ride inside the mind of a Mississippi Delta good-old-boy ex-deputy sheriff who is as vicious and racist as the worst 1950s-'60s stereotypes. Junior Ray Loveblood narrates the story in his own profane, colloquial voice, telling why he hates just about everybody and why he wants to shoot Leland Shaw, a shell-shocked World War II hero and poet who is hiding in a silo from what he believes are German patrols. Through a series of sleights of hand, misdirections, and near misses, Junior Ray and his sidekick Voyd give a dark tour of the Delta country as they chase their mysterious prey. Junior Ray's thoughts are peppered with excerpts from Shaw's notebooks--sometimes starkly different from Junior Ray's diatribe, sometimes eerily similar--and by the end of the story, it is up to the reader to sort out whose reality is more fantastic, Shaw's or Loveblood's, as the one stalks the other through the pages of this highly original and darkly comedic story.




Explorer's Guide Sarasota, Sanibel Island & Naples


Book Description

In this updated guide you’ll find the definitive word on this Gulf Coast area, its recreation, restaurants, hotels, and more, from deluxe to offbeat. Enjoy an insider’s vantage point on Charlotte Harbor’s wild shores, the coast’s sandy barrier islands, Naples’s polished allure, and Sarasota-Bradenton’s “sweet” history.




Explorer's Guide Sarasota, Sanibel Island, & Naples (Seventh Edition) (Explorer's Complete)


Book Description

The trusted guide to Florida's premier Gulf Coast destinations—now with a brand-new look! Whether Charlotte Harbor’s wild shorelines and preserved estuaries, or Sarasota’s historic culture sweetened by sugar magnates, travelers have an in-depth look on the environment, history, and culture of this beautiful stretch of coastline. Now in its 7th fully updated edition, this guide gives visitors and locals access to the best of Florida’s Gulf Coast. Do it all, from the fabled “Sanibel stoop” for collecting seashells to dining in the finest five-star bistros. The author’s deep local knowledge again provides the most reliable info available to this paradise. Each book in the Explorer’s Guide series gives travelers the tools and information they need to discover every corner of their destination. The helpful “What’s Where” section gives you the lay of the land; easy-to-read maps show you how to get around; handy icons point out amenities; and sidebars throughout recommend the must-see and must-do spots in each region. Everything you need to enjoy the beach is right here!