Mississippi Books

I found this book to be a great introduction to "who are the cajuns and where did they come from?" as well as an overview of their folk culture such as food, music and even some architecture. Not overly scholarly, it reads rather easy and would make a great introductory text for anyone who is interested in learning a little more about Cajuns.

I have read several sources on Cajun culture and traditions. I can objectively state that this book is superior, hands down. Ancelet gives a balanced and circular snap shot of the history of Cajun Culture and how it has evolved into its current form. The book is very endowed in the areas of music, cuisine, social gatherings, and the historical struggle of the Acadian descendents to salvage their identity in the mainstream United States. I would HIGHLY RECOMMEND this book for any collegiate research (it has served as the foundational source for a term paper of mine) or for anyone who has a true passion for the Cajun Culture.

I'm surprised that no one has yet reviewed this classic in the field of Cajun studies. "Cajun Country" should be subtitled "Everything You Wanted to Know about Traditional Cajun Culture But Were Afraid to Ask". It contains sections about history, religion, music, cuisine, as well as other aspects of the culture, including architecture, settlement patterns, language, storytelling, joke telling, gaming, folk medicine, and folk justice. Compiled by several top experts in the field, including premier Cajun scholars Barry Jean Ancelet and Carl A. Brasseaux, among others, this book is a "must have" for anyone intrigued by traditional Cajun culture -- note, however, my repeated use of the word "traditional," because this books concerns Cajuns of the past more so than today's Cajuns. An excellent index complements this volume, which I consult frequently as a reference work, although it is highly readable from cover to cover, and presented in a manner that any general reader can understand. Not only is this an excellent book for adults, but I would recommend it to high-school and junior-high readers.

A well selected collection of interviews with and news stories about the worldly author. Includes Hemingway's now famous 1958 interview with George Plimpton, as well as his speech to the American Writer's Congress and his Nobel Prize Acceptance speech. Hemingway at his most candid and insightful.

I'm a big Hemingway fan, and have liked other volumes in this "Conversations with" series. But this book was a disappointment to me, and certainly the weakest volume of the ones I've read (Peter Taylor's is excellent, as is the one for Katherine Anne Porter). Unless you're a beginner with Hemingway, there's very little of interest here, except perhaps Hemingway's remark that he writes every novel as though he were going to die afterwards. A related volume, "The Only Thing That Counts" -- while a bit slower going, is more useful. Still, if you're a Hemingway fan, you'll probably want to read this anyway. I did.

Conversations With Ernest Hemingway is an amazing piece of liteary insight into the mind of the man who created the masterpieces. The converstions flow between the abstract and direct. His personal feelings to the world at the time of each one of his recored converstaions and correspondence allows a Hemingway fan to scale some of his sotries. The book includes conversations in opposing times. One conversation was taken just after the release of a novel and then the follow-up ten years later which of course by Hemingway's way, only became more in depth and heart felt. This is an excellent book for anyone who can appriciated having the mind of Hemingway portrayed by his own words.

Rosemary Magee has gathered together for readers a compilation of twenty-two "conversations" with Flannery O'Connor -- interviews that originally appeared in a variety of newspapers, magazines and journals.

Her introduction describes O'Connor's responses to her interviewers and suggests that these responses illustrate and reflect her personality and interaction with others. Outlines O'Connor's varied approaches in dealing with reporters, participants of literary discussions, panels, and literary critics. Includes a chronology and index.

Interviewers include: Harvey Breit, Celestine Sibley, Betsy Lochridge, Margaret Turner, Robert Donner, Richard Gilman, Katherine Fugin, Faye Rivard, Margaret Sieh, Betsy Fancher, Granville Hicks, Joel Wells, Frank Daniel, Richard P. Frisbie, Gerard E. Sherry, and C. Ross Mullins, Jr.

Reader's may also be interested in reading Magee's discussion of the "preacher figure" in works by O'Connor, Robert Penn Warren, Eudora Welty, William Faulker, William Styron and Carson McCullers in her dissertation, "'Ambassador of God': The Preacher in Twentieth-Century Southern Fiction," completed at Emory University in 1982.

R. Neil Scott / Middle Tennessee State University

This text was not what I expected. Only the brief introduction is a narrative, while the text itself is a collection of the transcriptions from seminars, articles about O'Connor's life, and her answers to questions at various symposia. That is not to suggest that the book was not useful; instead, I gained valuable data that would have otherwise taken me hours to find in a library - all between the covers of this short book. (Some readers may be interested to know that some of the interviews may be recognized as those mocked by O'Connor in her letters in The Habit of Being.) It is interesting to observe her behavior as she participates in a panel discussion, and her responses are classic O'Connor.

I would recommend this book to those looking for data sources for research and those hoping for unfiltered insight into the person of Flannery O'Connor.

Stephen King has said his motto (something he jokingly said should be etched onto his tombstone) could be: "It is the tale, not he who tells it." I agree with him there and think more emphasis is placed on the creator of a literary work than maybe there ought to be. But still, one does become curious about a writer and the background that may or may not have gone into forming the individual who composed the tales that have contributed to that person's fame, infamy, or at least to his or her output. With a literary master such as Oates, it seems this compulsion to know more registers that much stronger. Here we have less a biographical piece on Joyce Carol Oates than Oates in her own words, telling of her works, her life, her world, her attitudes, as she feels them to be. Beginning at the tail-end of the left-leaning 1960's and concluding in the closing days of the Reagan era, this collection of interviews presents us with the ongoing evolution of a human being who has authored some of the strongest and most vivid literature in the canon of American writings. I found these conversations to be compelling reading, and would hope a sequel or updating of this book comes within this present decade.

"Conversations with Joyce Carol Oates" consists of interviews with various newspapers and magazines over a twenty-year period (1969-1989). It is the type of book to dip into at one's leisure. In it, Oates addresses the controversy that her publishers had with her adopting the pseudonym of Rosamund Smith. Another publisher sounds absolutely bitter between the smiles when talking of Oates's decision have "Bellefleur" published with Dutton. The Vanguard representative complains that the promos for that book are "ghastly."

Oates addresses her prolificacy and the charges that her writing is too violent. She mentions her influences from Balzac to Chekov and numerous others. She acknowledges the need for the Stephen Kings of the world who through their bestsellers keep the publishers churning out the lesser-knowns, the small little gems, that might otherwise be overlooked.

Interesting pieces include mentions of what were then forthcoming works, works that never ended up being published. What ever became of the novels "The Crosswicks Horror" and "The Green Island"? Oates mentions writing a screenplay for Martin Scorcese who wants to bring "You Must Remember This" to the cinema. A reader today is left wondering what ever happened to this adaptation.

All in all, an interesting glimpse of writer in her own words and a must-have for all Oates admirers.

This compilation of interviews and feature articles chronicles the maturation of one of America's most prolific writers. Starting in 1969 with an article first published in The New York Times Book Review and ending with a Q and A session in 1989, this volume is somewhat incomplete since Oates has now entered her later years, but it offers an excellent chronological look at how the author's views and literary sensibilities have evolved from before she won the National Book Award (for _them_) to the well-recognized writer of the late 1980s. Fans and scholars will find a wealth of material in these pages.

The Jay Parini article gives a succinct but full idea of Joyce Carol Oates in her then-new Princeton house. John Alfred Avant's 1972 interview delves into those writers who inspired her. Princeton colleague Elaine Showalter offers a more personal description of the author, who is often portrayed as being aloof; it's hilarious to know that Showalter once convinced Oates to go shopping (an activity that Oates decidedly dislikes) at a discount clothing store where she picked up a red mohair coat. The book includes an interview about her fascination with boxing, about her poetry (a genre she's less known for, though accomplished in), and her feelings about writing genre fiction under pseudonyms.

Aspiring writers, fans, and scholars will find much here to entertain and enlighten. In these pages, the skinny woman behind the owl glasses comes to life.

I suppose I'm a bit of a Larry Brown nut; I've read most everything he's penned, and this is a nice addition. It tells about how "it" all happened for him. A recommended "page-turner" for any up-and-coming writer.

This collection of interviews with the author throughout his lifetime is a candid look at the man and his methods. Each interview provides a unique look at the poor background Brown came from and how he taught himself to write over seven years. The origins of many of his novels and stort stories are discussed in his humble North Mississippi manner. He tells both stories of his early struggles and the later success and awards that he's received. I've read a lot of books for aspiring authors on the craft of writing and this was the best by far. He just tells it straight. If you're intrested in Larry, Southern Lit or just what it takes to make it as a writer this book is for you.

This collection of interviews was compiled after Larry Brown's untimely death, when he was only in his early 50's. Though Brown has left us with several books, Jay Watson wanted to honor the man behind the words by putting together some insightful interviews. The wonderful thing to read in these interviews is Brown's work ethic when it comes to writing. By his own estimates, when he was 29, Larry Brown decided that he wanted to become a writer and create books.

Rather than simply sit in classes and workshops and discuss writing, Brown, quite simply, wrote. By his estimates, he wrote close to 100 short stories and 5 novels before he wrote anything worth publishing (or, more accurately, before he could get objective enough about his own work to see that he was finally writing fiction that was worth the attention of others).

If you are looking for a collection of philosophy on writing, you aren't going to find it here like you might in Bledsoe's Getting Naked With Harry Crews, but that's because of how Larry Brown was as a writer--he saw the craft of being a writer as exactly that, a craft, and he worked at it regularly and didn't muse upon it for the benefit of wide-eyed newbies and hopefuls (as well as the benefit of his savings account). Brown wrote, and he took that, quite simply, as his livelihood, just the way he took being a fireman and a forklift operator in a stove factory as his livelihood. This book is mostly inspirational in reading about someone with a sound work ethic rather than a postulator on the art of writing.

Not that Brown is short of any gems. A true student of his craft, Brown is able to quote masters like Flannery O'Connor, but is also able to talk about the essence of tragedy and how his writing works out towards tragedy despite his best efforts, for his grandest search is to look for the truth of humans and his characters. A wonderful piece here is an excerpt from the documentary The Rough South of Larry Brown, an interview with Larry Brown and his wife. Here, we get to see another side of the soft-spoken Brown.

This is deifnitely a must-read for any aspiring writer. It may prove a little depressing to see how much Brown had to work before he could write publishable work, but a touch of reality just the same. Larry Brown will be missed.

I personally know Dorie Brunner and she is a fascinating woman. However, the book shown here is not the recent one. She changed publishers and the second print is fantastic. Be sure to track it down!! She is so much happier with the second print.

What an interesting book, I loved it!!
Dorie and Lou's canoe trip from Lake Bemidji in Minnesota to the city of New Orleans is an exciting river adventure. They experienced a number of hair-raising situations that made the book anything but boring. While dealing with the unforgiving weather and the unpredictable river, they meet some friendly people who helped them out along the way. And confronted some who didn't, like a skunk, a thief and other campsite intruders.
It's an excellent read for those who love camping, canoeing, river stories and even cats. Dorie gives a good description of their journey and preparations. Even though it took place back in the summer of 1960 it's still very informative and interesting. Especially for those who have a fancy for doing something like this.

A pet, such as a cat, can teach its human companions so many things about life. Not to mention how the silly antics of a cat can get its owners into trouble. Just as Dorie and Lou found out when they adopted a lonely kitten early in their trip.
Stinky the kitten is a wonderful ingredient to their story, and it's likely that you wont find anything similar to this book anywhere else.

In 1960, Dorie Brunner and Lou Germann, two Wisconsin school teachers, decided to paddle the Mississippi from the headwaters at Lake Itasca, MN to New Orleans. Shortly into their adventure, they rescued a small kitten from the muck on the shore, and "Stinky" ended up traveling 2000+ miles downriver with them, becoming the focal point of much of their travels.

What makes this book so charming is also what weakens it a bit...unlike most contemporary travel/adventure writers, Dorie and Lou obviously undertook this trip for the sheer adventure of it, not to race home and write a best seller. This is their authentic story, told by 74-year-old Dorie some 40 years later, drawing on memory...in fact, it doesn't appear that they even kept a journal. There is very little description of the places they visited, (though there are several photos) more about the daily hazards they faced, and Dorie apologizes for having long ago lost the names of people such as the tugboat captain who gave them a free ride for three days.

But the heart of the book is Stinky's story. If you're one who believes that cats wander into our lives when we need them most, you'll find this to be a very charming read.

this is a fine book with much helpful info, however it needs an update since the hurricane left much of the data obsolete.

This guide is outstanding! It contains the info need for a very challenging and interesting kayaking or boating trip all along the Gulf Coast waters. Great tips and suggestions throughout. I woul highly recommend this for your next boating adventure.

This is a thoroughly researched and very comprehensive guide to Mississippi's extensive coastal waterways, including detailed descriptions of Horn, Cat and the other offshore islands, with authoritative recommendations for boating, camping, and exploring. The author enriches the book with stories and anecdotes from his many waterways adventures and interesting people he has met. There are also significant details about the area's history, many photographs and an annotated map of the coastal region. Williams' book will be a timeless classic.

I found the book to be very informative & well written with scads of valuable information. I am amazed that the so called leaders of our society do not seem to be bother by what transpired.

As an avid amateur student of Mississippi history, I'm a fan of any book by W.O. "Chet" Dillard and would highly recommend all three that he's written--The Final Curtain, Clearburning, and Caveats from the Bench. Dillard's memories of his rough upbringing in rural Mississippi during the Depression make for a vivid portrait of what people endured during those harsh years in the South. He overcame these hardships and went on to become a distinguished lawyer, judge, and public official. Through the many years of his career, he's consistently shown the ability to take fresh, intelligent, and critical looks at the upheavals he witnessed in Mississippi during the civil rights era and beyond. The Final Curtain is a great addition to an important body of work by a man who was there to see so many momentous changes occur firsthand.

Alex Heard, editorial director, Outside magazine

As a concerned citizen I found this book,about the conduct of an agency of government that is supposed to protect our constitutional rights, very revealing and disturbing. With the exhibits and first hand information presented, it is obvious that people, who were otherwise guilty of unpardonable crimes, were nonetheless convicted utilizing illegal and unconstitutional means (the Mafia).

This episode in our history is well presented and should concern every citizen because without equal protection of the law everyone is vulnerable. This book exposes the FBI for what they really are: politically motivated and they think that the ends justifies the means.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in seeing that our system of justice is not used for political expediency.

Another thriller from the SURVIVAL! series. These historical survival adventures are awesome. This book isn't as action-packed as the others, but it held particular interest to me becuase I'm of African-American descent like Molly and this adventure is set in just a turbulent time of history. I like that Garrett and Molly are best friends despite their skin color, and I like the fact they they fight together to survive the flood and get out alive.

Molly Bride and Garrett Wood are both from poor families barely making a living on Mississippi cotton farms in 1927. Molly and Garrett dream of getting away from Mayersville, their little home town. So for three years, they've been saving up nickels and pennies and hiding them in a secret place. But the rising, raging Mississippi threatens the money, and Molly and Garrett go to retrieve it. But the current wins, and they find themselves headed up the turbulent Mississippi on a little homemade raft. Can Molly and Garrett survive? I couldn't put this book down! The part with the water moccasin was so scary, I felt as if I was there. A very, very exciting book!

Most people think it's odd that Garrett Wood and Molly Bride are best friends. The place is Mississippi, the year 1927, and Garrett is white while Molly is black. But they ignore what everyone else says and remain friends. They're united in their dreams of getting away from their dreary lives on cotton farms. For some time now they've been saving money in a jar in the bayou. When the rising waters of the Mississippi threaten to put the bayou underwater, Garrett and Molly set out on their little homemade raft to retrieve the money. But instead, they end up being swept down the river. They encounter dangerous currents filled with debris, poisonous snakes, and storms. Their journey will truly test their courage and friendship. An excellant survival story with historical details about life in the south in the 1920s.

Fascinating Book! This book has retaught me a lot about the non-Civil War. My ancestors lived in the Free State of Jones during the 1860's; some joined the Confederate army and others joined the Union army. I now realize that the history we are taught in schools is a sterile perspective stripped of all the choas and complexities that give a true understanding of events. This is the beginning of a new learning adventure that will extend back to the Revolutionary War -- and beyond.

I have always wondered exactly what happened in Jones County, Mississippi, during the recent unpleasantness, and after reading The Free State of Jones, now I know. Often billed as the county that seceded from the Confederacy, the author provides an excellent local history of Southwest Mississippi from the early 1800s to the dawn of the Civil Rights movement. The author begins with the immigrants to Mississippi territory, mainly from the Carolinas. Excellent maps of migration routes and the early counties in the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi are included. During the Civil War, a band of 100 or so deserters from Confederate military service hid in Jones County, where the soil did not promote large commercial planting, and few individuals owned slaves. While there was never a formal act of secession from the Confederacy by the county government of Jones, the band of deserters did fight fourteen skirmishes with Confederate troops between 1863 and 1865, and many locals were sympathethic, either because they were relatives, they didn't like the relatively strong central Confederate government, or Confederate troops misbehaved by stealing from their small farms. Many of the band deserted because the felt the war was "a rich man's war and a poor man's fight"--especially after the "20 Negro Law" was passed exempting slaveowners with 20 or more slaves from Confederate military service. The author also goes into the mixed racial family of the leader of the band of deserters, Newt Knight, who survived until 1922. There are few places to read the details of this interesting micro-history within the Confederacy. Ms. Bynum's thoroughly researched book encompasses the whole story, and is worth the effort of delving into such a detailed local history.

Ms. Bynum provides a well researched and written account of the lifestyles and circumstandes of the people of Jones County, MS, leading up to the Civil War. Her research takes us back into North and South Carolina, prior to 1800, and follows the families of early Jones County settlers. She goes into details, explaining the different economic, cultural, and religious factors that served to mold the life of the everyday Jones County citizen.
The Free State of Mississippi... is a must read for anyone whith roots in Jones Co., MS, as well as for anyone who is simply interested in deep South History.