The seven stories in Pam Durban's widely praised debut collection are tales of family, of love and loss, of survival and affirmation. Durban's resonant prose subtly obliges her readers to experience the rush of icy water in a stream, the taste of greens freshly snatched from an overgrown garden, the dread weight of confusion and uncertainty. In "This Heat," the opening story, a mill worker faces the long-expected loss of her teenage son when his weak heart finally gives out. In the title story, which concludes the collection, a formidably eccentric woman abruptly leaves her daughter and granddaughter to answer a "calling" to do missionary work in Africa. Framed between these two stories is a gathering of characters made real and consequential by Durban's touch: a country singer more than a few big breaks short of stardom, a preadolescent boy lovestruck over his private swimming instructor, a father cut off from his children by haunting war memories, and others.

Rudyard Kipling, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature in 1907, has long been considered an important and vibrant, even controversial, storyteller and poet. The Wish House and Other Stories is a collection of Kipling’s finest works, including the stories “In the House of Suddhoo,” “The Disturber of Traffic,” and “The Eye of Allah,” the poems “The Runners,” “The Return of the Children,” and “The Last Ode,” and his famous story about Afghanistan, “The Man Who Would Be King.” Each piece was selected by poet and scholar Craig Raine, who writes in his Preface, “We need to think about Kipling. He is our greatest short-story writer, but one whose achievement is more complex and surprising than even his admirers recognize.”

It doesn’t matter if you’re the lowest person on the totem pole at work—you are a leader. Whether it’s on the job, within your family, at church, in clubs, or as a friend, you are called to be a leader on a daily basis. In this book of African animal fables, John Andrew Carroll, a successful CEO who grew up surrounded by wildlife and war in Zimbabwe, explores how to: • be a trusted and compassionate human being as you lead and serve others; • develop team members who are engaged, enthusiastic, and inspired; • learn, grow, and adapt as a leader, and help others do the same. These lessons and more are shared in a series of captivating, short fables that feature a self-doubting lion, a belligerent rhinoceros, a cute and kind meerkat, a curious young elephant, a conceited leopard, and a chattering monkey. Each fable highlights a key aspect of what makes an effective leader in today’s world. Full of wisdom, wit, and simple pleasure, this book is a celebration of what it means to be human in a changed and changing world.

Simply retold and wonderfully illustrated, this series brings together charming tales that children will enjoy. Each story takes approximately 10 minutes to read.

Founded at the University of Georgia in 1947 and published there ever since, The Georgia Review has become one of America's most highly regarded journals of arts and letters. Never stuffy and never shallow, The Georgia Review seeks a broad audience of intellectually open and curious readers--and strives to give those readers rich content that invites and sustains repeated attention and consideration. Pulitzer Prize winners and never-before-published writers are equals during the journal's manuscript evaluation process, whose goal is to identify and print stories, poems, and essays that promise to be of lasting merit. The year 2012 marks the sixty-fifth anniversary of The Georgia Review, and Stories Wanting Only to Be Heard will acknowledge that milestone by presenting a selection of the remarkable short fiction published across the decades. The collection includes the work of well-known writers, many of whom were not yet so well known when first selected for publication by The Georgia Review, and also highlights compelling work from writers whose names may not be as familiar but whose stories are equally compelling and memorable. The stories collected here--each one vivid, distinctive, and worthwhile to read--stand as testament to the significance of The Georgia Review's decades of work to identify and promote writing of exceptional quality. Publication of this book was made possible, in part, by the President's Venture Fund through generous gifts of the University of Georgia Partners.

Georgia has played a formative role in the writing of America. Few states have produced a more impressive array of literary figures, among them Conrad Aiken, Erskine Caldwell, James Dickey, Joel Chandler Harris, Carson McCullers, Flannery O'Connor, Jean Toomer, and Alice Walker. This volume contains biographical and critical discussions of Georgia writers from the nineteenth century to the present as well as other information pertinent to Georgia literature. Organized in alphabetical order by author, the entries discuss each author's life and work, contributions to Georgia history and culture, and relevance to wider currents in regional and national literature. Lists of recommended readings supplement most entries. Especially important Georgia books have their own entries: works of social significance such as Lillian Smith's Strange Fruit, international publishing sensations like Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind, and crowning artistic achievements including Jean Toomer's Cane. The literary culture of the state is also covered, with information on the Georgia Review and other journals; the Georgia Center for the Book, which promotes authors and reading; and the Townsend Prize, given in recognition of the year's best fiction. This is an essential volume for readers who want both to celebrate and learn more about Georgia's literary heritage.

An insightful guidebook to some of the best examples of modern Southern fiction, as selected by an international group of critics In Still in Print, eighteen southern novels published since 1997 fall under the careful scrutiny of an international cast of accomplished literary critics to identify the very best of recent writings in the genre. These essays highlight the praiseworthy efforts of a pantheon of novelists celebrating and challenging regionality, unearthing manifestations of the past in the present, and looking to the future with wit and healthy skepticism. Organized around shared themes of history, place, humor, and malaise, the novels discussed here interrogate southern culture and explore the region's promise for the future. Four novels reconsider the Civil War and its aftermath as Charles Frazier, Kaye Gibbons, Josephine Humphreys, and Pam Durban revisit the past and add fresh insights to contemporary discussions of race and gender through their excursions into history. The novels by Steve Yarbrough, Larry Brown, Chris Offutt, Barry Hannah, and James Lee Burke demonstrate a keen sense of place, rooted in a South marked by fundamentalism, poverty, violence, and rampant prejudice but still capable of promise for some unseen future. The comic fiction of George Singleton, Clyde Edgerton, James Wilcox, Donald Harington, and Lewis Nordan shows how southern humor still encompasses customs and speech reflected in concrete places. Ron Rash, Richard Ford, and Cormac McCarthy probe the depths of human existence, often with disturbing results, as they write about protagonists cut off from their own humanity and desperate to reconnect with the human race. Diverse in content but unified in genre, these particular novels have been nominated by the contributors to Still in Print for long-term survival as among the best modern representations of the southern novel. Featuring: M. Thomas Inge on Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain Clara Juncker on Josephine Humphreys's Nowhere Else on Earth Kathryn McKee on Kaye Gibbons's On the Occasion of My Last Afternoon Jan Nordby Gretlund on Pam Durban's So Far Back Tara Powell on Percival Everett's Erasure Tom Dasher on Steve Yarbrough's The Oxygen Man Jean Cash on Larry Brown's Fay Carl Wieck on Chris Offutt's The Good Brother Owen W. Gilman Jr. on Barry Hannah's Yonder Stands Your Orphan Hans H. Skei on James Lee Burke's Crusader's Cross Charles Israel on George Singleton's Work Shirts for Madmen John Grammer on Clyde Edgerton's The Bible Salesman Scott Romine on James Wilcox's Heavenly Days Edwin T. Arnold on Donald Harington's Enduring Marcel Arbeit on Lewis Nordan's Lightning Song Thomas Ærvold Bjerre on Ron Rash's One Foot in Eden Robert H. Brinkmeyer Jr. on Richard Ford's The Lay of the Land Richard Gray on Cormac McCarthy's The Road

The South Carolina Encyclopedia Guide to South Carolina Writers expands the range of writers included in the landmark South Carolina Encyclopedia. This guide updates the entries on writers featured in the original encyclopedia and augments that list substantially with dozens of new essays on additional authors from the late eighteenth century to the present who have contributed to the Palmetto State's distinctive literary heritage. Each profile in this concise reference includes essential biographical facts and critical assessments to place the featured writers in the larger context of South Carolina's literary tradition. The guide comprises 128 entries written by more than sixty-nine literary scholars, and it also highlights the sixty-nine writers inducted thus far into the South Carolina Academy of Authors, which serves as the state's literary hall of fame. Rich in natural beauty and historic complexity, South Carolina has long been a source of inspiration for writers. The talented novelists, essayists, poets, playwrights, journalists, historians, and other writers featured here represent the countless individuals who have shared tales and lore of South Carolina. The guide includes a foreword by George Singleton, author of two novels, four short story collections and one nonfiction book, and a 2010 inductee of the South Carolina Academy of Authors.

Georgia has produced some of the major figures of modern literature, including Carson McCullers, Erskine Caldwell and, most notably, Flannery O'Connor. While such writers are firmly established in American literary history, all too few readers are aware of how the state's tradition of literary excellence persists in the present day. The thirty stories in After O'Connor were written during the past fifteen years by authors who were born in Georgia or spent a significant part of their lives and careers in this state. Embracing the social, cultural, and ethnic variety in today's Georgia, After O'Connor both advances and helps redefine the great southern storytelling tradition.

Stories and selections from novels by twenty writers depict the complexities of life in the modern South