Book Reviews

A Deeper South: The Beauty, Mystery, and Sorrow of the Southern Road   By Pete Candler   University of South Carolina Press, 2024   Paperback: $27.99   Genre: Memoir, Southern History, Travelogue   Reviewed by Edward Journey     In her foreword to Pete Candler’s A Deeper South: The Beauty, Mystery, and Sorrow of the Southern Road, Rosanne Cash writes that she has “learned that to come into the fullness of our own potential, we must know our own history.” Candler begins the book with an [...]

The Heiress  By Rachel Hawkins  St. Martin’s Press, 2023  Fiction, thriller  Reviewed by Lenore Vickrey  I was first introduced to Rachel Hawkins when I read The Wife Upstairs a few years ago. I was intrigued by the fact that the author was an Alabamian, and the book was set in Birmingham, where I grew up. I always like to support the home-grown talent in our state, and I wasn’t disappointed. So, when presented with another Hawkins book, The Heiress, I was [...]

Butterfly Nebula  By Laura Reece Hogan  The Backwaters Press, 2023  Paperback: $17.95  Genre: Poetry  Reviewed by Jennifer Horne  A glimpse into my internet search history while reading this book gives a good indication of its subject matter: firework jellyfish, vampire squid, question mark butterfly, Be star, camel eye of needle, Elysia sea slug, via negativa, Daphne mythology, tiger shark, Microscopium constellation, Hydra constellation, Crux constellation, Telescopium constellation, Phoenix constellation, Siphonophores, praya dubia, manatee nebula, lyrebird, blue hour. Suffice it to say [...]

Trees of Alabama  By Lisa J. Samuelson  The University of Alabama Press, 2020  Paperback: $34.95; eBook: $34.95  Genre: Nonfiction, Educational  Reviewed by Jim Plott  Auburn University forestry professor Lisa Samuelson might have unintentionally stirred up a controversy with her latest book, Trees of Alabama. Should you use it as a field guide to help identify trees in the woods, or do you keep it at home as a library reference book? Certainly, the cover and pages are thick enough to withstand [...]

Bigger: A Literary Life  By Trudier Harris  Yale University Press, 2024  Paperback  Nonfiction  Reviewed by Charlotte C. Teague  After more than eighty years, Richard Wright's Native Son (1940) is still relevant to the life that we live, and in her newest book, renowned scholar Trudier Harris shows readers why. Harris crafts an exceptional biography of Wright's fictional character, Bigger Thomas, who readers typically either hate, pity, or misunderstand. Rarely has he been understood, according to Harris; however, she urges readers to [...]

Through Old Ground  By Randy Cross  Bluewater Publications, 2024  Paperback; $24.95  Genre: Memoir  Reviewed by Lisa Harrison  In the tradition of Lewis Grizzard and Rick Bragg comes community college English professor Randy Cross, whose collection of essays Through Old Ground holds its own with the best. This memoir takes readers down a lane of reminiscences beginning in Cross’s sleepy, small hometown of St. Joseph, Tennessee, and winding through foreign locales of Rio de Janeiro and Lisbon. Along the way, Cross recounts [...]

Accidental Activist: Changing the World One Small Step at a Time  By Mary Allen Jolley  Livingston Press, 2024  Paperback: $19.95  Genre: Memoir  Reviewed by Edward Journey  The long and productive life of service of Mary Allen Jolley (1928-2023) is documented in her memoir Accidental Activist: Changing the World One Small Step at a Time. At a time when vicious and rampant partisan divides threaten our democracy, Jolley recalls a time of reaching “across the aisle” and making positive changes for the [...]

We the People: Confessions of a Caucasian Southerner  By Harry Moore  Broadstone Books, 2024  Paperback: $28.75  Genre: Poetry  Reviewed by Edward Journey  In our current urgent age of reckoning, poet Harry Moore has written a collection of poems that recall a time that might seem remote to some. Moore evokes the memories of the past that must be reconciled with the present, as these poems – many of them autobiographical – wrestle with a personal legacy that Moore now realizes was [...]

From Every Stormy Wind That Blows  By S. Jonathan Bass  LSU Press, 2024  Cloth: $50.00  Genre: History  Reviewed by Foster Dickson  If you were to ask around among average Alabamians today, many would know that Samford University in Birmingham is a longstanding Baptist institution. But considering that Samford adopted its current name in the mid-1960s, at a time when anyone under sixty had not yet been born, and that its history in Birmingham began when its predecessor college was moved from [...]

Glass Cabin  by Tina Mozelle Braziel and James Braziel  Pulley Press, 2024  Paperback: $18.00  Genre: Poetry  Reviewed by Foster Dickson  Often, when we pick up a book, it’s easy to assume that the title could just be figurative, some image or turn of phrase meant to shape our thinking as we approach the work. But in the case of Glass Cabin, the title is about as literal as literal can be. This work is a hybrid collection of poetry and prose [...]

You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World  Ada Limón, Editor  Milkweed Editions in association with The Library of Congress, 2024  Hard cover: $24.00  Genre: Poetry  Reviewed by Wendy Cleveland    Ada Limón, the 24th United States Poet Laureate, has established a two-part signature project to bring poetry to the people.  Launched in April of 2024, Poetry in the Parks will continue throughout the year with installments of poetry as public art on picnic tables in seven national parks. Each installation [...]

There Is Happiness: New and Selected Stories By Brad Watson W.W. Norton & Company, 2024 Hardcover: $29.99; eBook: $20.99 Genre: Short Stories Reviewed by Edward Journey The astonishing fiction of Brad Watson is available in a new collection, There Is Happiness: New and Selected Stories. For readers familiar with Watson’s work, the collection includes eight favorite stories published in two previous short story collections – Last Days of the Dog-Men (1996) and Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives (2010) – [...]

Africatown: America’s Last Slave Ship and the Community it Created By Nick Tabor St. Martin’s Press, 2023 Cloth, $29.99 African American History/Alabama Reviewed by Scotty E. Kirkland  Writer and critic Hilton Als tells us that when you read a writer’s work in a popular magazine, you are really seeing two writers. “There’s the person who has something to say, and the person who has to make that something fit.” In 2018, journalist Nick Tabor began working on a New York Magazine [...]

Bound to Dream: An Immigrant Story and The Magic Box: A Book of Opposites  By Charles Ghigna   Schiffer Publishing   Hardback: $18.99 and $14.99  Genre: Children’s  Reviewed by Barbara Barcellona Smith   My great pleasure in reviewing author Charles Ghigna’s two newest books comes from a mutual respect and admiration for our shared cultural histories. Charles’ great-grandfather and my own father both immigrated to America from Italy. Their stories of hardship, grit, and determination contributed to the fabric of our own lives and [...]

AWF is pleased to post Books in Brief, a compendium of titles recently received in the office. Full-length reviews will often be forthcoming, but we hope BIB provides a quick peek at new works in time for your next bookstore or library visit. So many good things to share!

Mosquito Warrior: Yellow Fever, Public Health, and the Forgotten Career of General William C. Gorgas By Carol R. Byerly The University of Alabama Press, 2024 Hardcover: $120.00; Paperback: $39.95; eBook: $39.95 Genre: Biography, History Reviewed by Edward Journey Alabama schoolchildren used to learn that Alabamian “William Crawford Gorgas (1854-1920) conquered yellow fever in the Panama Canal Zone” while students at the University of Alabama studied at the Amelia Gayle Gorgas Library, named after William’s mother, and regularly passed the Gorgas House [...]

Meet Me in Mumbai: A Memoir  By Lovelace Cook  Whisperwood Publishing, 2023  Paper: $19.99  Memoir  Reviewed by Lenore Vickrey  I’ve long had a desire to drop everything and travel to some remote part of the world to taste new foods, breathe the air, meet the native people, and immerse myself in a foreign culture. Not an extended trip, mind you, but enough to get a feel for another part of the planet that I could document with photos and create new [...]

The Founding of Alabama: Background and Formative Period in the Great Bend and Madison County By Frances Cabaniss Roberts, edited and with an introduction by Thomas Reidy University of Alabama Press, 2020 Paper, $39.95 History/Alabama Reviewed by Scotty E. Kirkland  One of the lasting contributions of Alabama’s multifaceted, three-year celebration of the bicentennial of statehood was the number of fine books it produced. The Founding of Alabama, the long-awaited publication in book form of Dr. Frances Cabaniss Roberts’ dissertation, certainly fits [...]

Running Past Dark  By Han Nolan  McElderry Books, 2023  Hardcover: $19.99  Genre: Young Adult  Reviewed by Lynn Lamere  Han Nolan manages to artfully combine thriller with teenage angst in her book Running Past Dark. The novel centers around a unique genre of running, and Nolan’s novel keeps a running pace with short chapters and engaging dialogue.  The reader is introduced to a troubled protagonist right away. Scotlyn (Scottie) and her sister Caitlyn (Cait) were inseparable as twins often are, and Scottie [...]

Grave History: Death, Race, and Gender in Southern Cemeteries  Edited by Kami Fletcher and Ashley Towle  The University of Georgia Press, 2023  Paper: $32.95  Nonfiction; Academic   Reviewed by Mollie Smith Waters   Grave History: Death, Race, and Gender in Southern Cemeteries is a collection of scholarly essays about various cemeteries throughout the American South. The book focuses on the historical and cultural significance of the selected cemeteries and what they can tell us about how cemeteries helped promote and sustain race, class, [...]

Rich Justice  By Robert Bailey  Thomas & Mercer, 2024  Paperback: $16.99  Genre: Legal Thriller  Reviewed by Edward Journey  Robert Bailey harnesses the mystique and mythology of Alabama’s Sand Mountain region in Rich Justice, Bailey’s tenth novel and the third in his series of Jason Rich legal thrillers. Bailey, a Huntsville attorney, is the bestselling author of the Bocephus Haynes series and the McMurtrie and Drake series, in addition to the Jason Rich books and The Golfer’s Carol, an inspirational novel.   Jason [...]

Between Chance and Mercy  By James E. Cherry   Aquarius Press/Willow Books, 2024  Paper: $17.95  Genre: Poetry  Reviewed by Jeanie Thompson  Between Chance and Mercy, the latest poetry collection from Tennessee poet James E. Cherry, traces racial history and race relations in America, the COVID era, disturbing contemporary events, and personal moments of insight and longing. That’s a big buffet, but each poem is a personal narrative and also a mirror to our own lives. To read Between Chance and Mercy [...]

A Luthier’s Life: The Guitar Odyssey of Roger Fritz By Willie G. Moseley Acclaim Press, 2023 Paper: $29.95 Genre: Music, Biography Reviewed by Doug Simms Willie Moseley’s (Senior Writer for Vintage Guitar Magazine) well-illustrated chronological review of Roger Fritz’s diverse life and accomplishments presents a dazzling matrix of opportunities fulfilled that could easily occupy several lifetimes. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to be a popular guitar tech/luthier and have a successful guitar company, it's all here. Willie [...]

be gentle with Black girls by Tania De’Shawn Element Agape, 2022 Paper: $15.00 Genre: Poetry Reviewed by: Katharine Armbrester In one of the poems from her chapbook be gentle with Black girls, Tania De’Shawn writes: “adulthood ravished my girlhood like a relaxer on virgin hair…on the days when your skin is a minefield of triggers / breathe.” Laced with pain and raw emotion, her work will leave the reader shaken, educated, and roused by De’Shawn’s writing. Adultification bias is the [...]