Books set in the American South

[legolammb]

I'm a big fan of books set in the South - I think it started with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings years ago and studying Mockingbird at school. I loved the Secret Life of Bees, Fried Green Tomatoes... does anyone have any other recommendations?

It depends on what you like reading really - there’s a huge range of genres,

The Help, obviously.

Gone With the Wind!

Charlene Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse series (True Blood- so if you like vampires...)

Greg Iles has written a series of books which are really thrillers but explore issues of race in some detail - the Penn Cage books.

I haven’t read it myself, but people rave about The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers.

A Time to Kill by John Grisham.

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

Thanks for the response. I read a fairly wide range of genres - I've enjoyed several John Grishams and some 'better' crime novels - Galveston for example. The Penn Cage series sounds very promising so I'll give the first one a go.

I'm not too keen on fantasy/vampires, though I'm quite interested in spirituality - I recently read Sing Unburied Sing, which I found amazing, and I was fascinated by the hoodoo references in that.

The Heart is a lonely hunter sounds excellent though I'm maybe feeling a bit too fragile for it at the moment.

Zora Neale Hurston Their Eyes were watching God, Alice Walker The Color Purple, Maya Angelou I know why the caged bird sings are all great, I couldn't personally cope with Gone with the Wind one of the most racist books I've ever encountered which also makes excuses for slavery and for the rise of the KKK (also plays havoc with actual history), and even for its time was considered a highly controversial book.

Beloved (I hate it)

Dottie - I've read and loved all of those books. I'm with you on Gone With the Wind - I haven't read it but have heard enough not to want to.

Thunder - I tried reading Beloved but as with the few other Toni Morrison novels I tried, couldn't get through it. I was maybe a bit young though so should perhaps revisit

Divine secrets of the ya ya sisterhood
Fannie Flagg, author of Fried Green Tomatoes, has written a lot of books set in the south.

If you like mysteries, I recommend the Deborah Knott mysteries by Margaret Maron. They are set in North Carolina. The sleuth is a young woman judge with a set of quirky-as-only-Southerners-can-be relatives.

Another mystery series are the Skip Langdon books by Julie Smith, set in New Orleans.

I highly recommend this non-fiction book that reads like a novel: John Berendt’s “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” about Savannah.

The novels of Carl Hiaasen, set in Florida.

The novels of Gail Godwin; my favorite is "Father Melancholy’s Daughter."

Some of the works of Anne Rivers Siddons are good reads; I recommend “Heartbreak Hotel”, set in a Southern university during the Civil Rights Movement.

Rick Bragg’s memoir “It’s All Over but the Shoutin’”

OP Phew, I loved the Fannie Flagg too though, as well as the film! Trying to think of other things, have you read any Barbara Kingsolver? At least one of hers Prodigal Summer is set in the South, and is readable like Flagg, with strong female characters and well-written. Have heard good things about Cane River Lalita Tademy, it's a family saga. If you liked the Hurston, Jean Toomer's Cane is being reissued, she's a similar writer. Also Tayari Jones writes about the South and is supposed to be good, I've got one of hers on my pile.

I recently read Kindred by Octavia E Butler, that’s about a young black woman who repeatedly travels back in time from 1976 to Maryland in 1815 to save the life of one of her ancestors (who’s white and who’s family owns a plantation).

The time travel is a very minor part of the story, so don’t be put off by that if time travel sounds a bit fantastical. The main focus is on slavery. It’s harrowing in parts but not gratuitously so.

Stitches agree ;Kindred is excellent, although as you noted quite traumatic; I also love her Parable of the Seeds and the sequel too. I thought of another Southern book which is on my tbr list Queen Sugar by Natalie Bazile, it's recently been adapted for Oprah Winfrey's channel in the US.

Have you read any Carson McCullers or Flannery O'Connor?

Attica Locke's books about Texas - though it's certainly southern it's slightly different to the traditional South/Deep South, but she writes about many of the same issues.

Colson Whitehead- The Underground Railroad

Came on here to say Beloved as well

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

Agree Gone With The Wind is horribly racist. I remember reading it as a teenager, after having been dragged along to the cinema by my mum to see a re-showing of it. The film was a sanitised version of the story. The novel is horrible with its tales of beatings and lynchings of former slaves and the emergence of the KKK. I am planning a reread of it some time soon, if I can bear it, to see what else I might have forgotten. Absolutely hated Scarlett O'Hara too.

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee is a favourite novel - I studied it at school. But regret reading Go Set a Watchman - ruined the original for me.

A Confederacy of Dunces

I was going to say Flannery O'Connor too. Southern gothic.
Also, much lighter, The Divine Secrets of the Yaya sisterhood.

Dottie thanks for the Parable of the Seeds recommendation.

Kindred’s the first book by Octavia E Butler I’ve read and has left me interested in having a look at more of Butler’s writing. Although at the minute this will probably depend a lot on whether my local library stocks more of her books!

You might like Calling Me Home by Julie Kibler. I also liked Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi. The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd is next on my list.

I loved Pat Conroys books, The Prince of Tides , The Great Sandini etc.

Oh my god I LOVE a confederacy of Dunces!

I seem to recall that Donna Tartt's The Little Friend is set in Mississippi and is in the gothic South style

Ooo and I second Attica Locke

The Awakening by Kate Chopin

Property by Valerie Martin is brilliant - lovely short little novel set in the 18th century from the POV of a slave owner. Beautifully written and interestingly different.

William Faulkner: "The Sound and The Fury" incredible book.

@momentomori I was going to suggest that too. I'll return to this thread with more recommendations.