One of my favorite book genres is Southern Gothic. Love it! Can't get enough of it!
So what is Southern Gothic Literature?
Southern Gothic novels often deal with the plight of those who are ostracized or oppressed by traditional Southern culture, characters being damaged or delusional, supernatural happenings, murders and the sweltering heat of the South.
The early authors of this genre are Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Southern Gothic literature was revived in the 1920's through William Faulkner.
So here we go, in no particular order.
The Witching Hour (Mayfair Witches, Book 1)By Anne Rice1990 |  |
The first in the Mayfair Witches series, The Witching Hour introduces the fictional Mayfair family of New Orleans, generations of male and female witches. This tight-knit and deeply connected family, where a death of one strengthens the others with his/her knowledge.
One Mayfair witch per generation is also designated to receive the powers of "the man," known as Lasher. Lasher gives the witches gifts, excites them, and protects them. Unsure as to exactly what this spirit is, the Mayfair clan knows him variously as a protector, a god-like figure, a sexual being, and the image of death.
Lasher's current witch is Deirdre, who lies catatonic from psychological shock treatments. Deirdre's daughter, Rowan, has been spirited away from this "evil" and has happily become a neurosurgeon and has an uncanny gift to see the intent behind the facade. Rowan also has a gift few doctors possess--she can heal cells. Yet, though she uses it to save lives, she also fears that she has caused several deaths. She rescues Michael from drowning. Michael then develops some extraordinary powers that compel him to seek New Orleans and to seek Rowan. He finds both, and pulls the tale closer together by meeting people connected to the Mayfair family who now fear Rowan because she is the first Mayfair who can kill without Lasher's help. Michael dives into learning the history of the Mayfair witches: Deborah, Charlotte, Mary Beth, Stella, Antha, and many others across hundreds of years and three continents.
When Michael looks up from his reading, he learns that Rowan has come to New Orleans to attend her mother's funeral. Rowan learns of her family history, her ancestral home in shambles, and Lasher waiting for the next one. Rowan dedicates herself to stopping Lasher's reign. Michael too has his own mission, but it is foggy and unclear to him. But Lasher is seductively powerful and Rowan's gifts offer him the opportunity to achieve his ultimate goal.
The Last ChildBy John Hart2009 |  |
Thirteen year-old Johnny Merrimon had the perfect life: a warm home and loving parents; a twin sister, Alyssa, with whom he shared an irreplaceable bond. He knew nothing of loss, until the day Alyssa vanished from the side of a lonely street. Now, a year later, Johnny finds himself isolated and alone, failed by the people he'd been taught since birth to trust. No one else believes that Alyssa is still alive, but Johnny is certain that she is—confident in a way that he can never fully explain.
Determined to find his sister, Johnny risks everything to explore the dark side of his hometown. It is a desperate, terrifying search, but Johnny is not as alone as he might think. Detective Clyde Hunt has never stopped looking for Alyssa either, and he has a soft spot for Johnny. He watches over the boy and tries to keep him safe, but when Johnny uncovers a dangerous lead and vows to follow it, Hunt has no choice but to intervene.
Then a second child goes missing...
Undeterred by Hunt's threats or his mother's pleas, Johnny enlists the help of his last friend, and together they plunge into the wild, to a forgotten place with a history of violence that goes back more than a hundred years. There, they meet a giant of a man, an escaped convict on his own tragic quest. What they learn from him will shatter every notion Johnny had about the fate of his sister; it will lead them to another far place, to a truth that will test both boys to the limit.
Where The Woodbine TwinesBy Sherry Austin2006 |  |
The coincidental sighting of someone resembling a long-lost childhood acquaintance sets off a flood of memories about their strange experience. She hopes she'll at last find the answer to the question that has stuck with her all the years since: Whatever became of the unforgettable Catherine Wiley?
Set against the live-oak splendor of the South Carolina low country and the dark glamour of Myrtle Beach in the 1950s, this tale of nostalgia, fear, and hope twists like a leaf in the wind.
Master Of The DeltaBy Thomas H. Cook2008 |  |
In 1954 Mississippi, Jack Branch returns to his father's Delta estate, Great Oaks, to perform an act of noblesse oblige: teaching at the local high school. While conducting a class on evil throughout history, Jack is shocked to discover that his unassuming student Eddie is the son of the Coed Killer, a notorious local murderer.
Jack feels compelled to mentor the boy, encouraging Eddie to examine his father's crime and using his own good name to open the doors that Eddie's lineage can't. But when Eddie's investigation turns in an unexpected direction, Jack finds himself questioning Eddie's motives and his own. As the deadly consequences of Jack's actions fall inescapably into place, Thomas H. Cook masterfully reveals the darker truths that lurk in the recesses of small-town lives and in the hearts of well-intentioned men...
Fox's EarthBy Anne Rivers Siddons1981 |  |
Ruth Yancey knew she was beautiful, she knew she was special. Despite her squalid Georgia mill town roots, it was her looks and her inbred belief in a powerful destiny that led her to the most exquisite mansion in Sparta: Fox's Earth. Through insinuation, manipulation, and an impenetrable evil, she became its mistress for three generations--until another woman attempted to match her madness....
A dark and seductive tale of five generations of Southern women and the house that was at once both their greatest inheritance and their most confining prison.
In 1904, Ruth Yancey is only ten years old when she is brought to live at the magnificent mansion called Fox's Earth. But the impoverished daughter of an abusive mill worker has already internalized her mother's steely code: men may hold all the power, but a woman possesses one thing that can get her anything in the world she wants... if she's prepared to make certain sacrifices.
Deserted by her mother in order to give her a better chance at wealth, Ruth's own ambition drives her to possess Fox's Earth at any cost, even though her sacrifice will ultimately be her own husband, children and grandchildren.
Midnight In The Garden Of Good And EvilBy John Berendt1994 |  |
Shots rang out in Savannah's grandest mansion in the misty, early morning hours of May 2, 1981. Was it murder or self-defense? For nearly a decade, the shooting and its aftermath reverberated throughout this hauntingly beautiful city of moss-hung oaks and shaded squares. John Berendt's sharply observed, suspenseful, and witty narrative reads like a thoroughly engrossing novel, and yet it is a work of nonfiction.
Berendt skillfully interweaves a hugely entertaining first-person account of life in this isolated remnant of the Old South with the unpredictable twists and turns of a landmark murder case.
It is a spellbinding story peopled by a gallery of remarkable characters: the well-bred society ladies of the Married Woman's Card Club; the turbulent young redneck gigolo; the hapless recluse who owns a bottle of poison so powerful it could kill every man, woman, and child in Savannah; the aging and profane Southern belle who is the "soul of pampered self-absorption"; the uproariously funny black drag queen; the acerbic and arrogant antiques dealer; the sweet-talking, piano-playing con artist; young blacks dancing the minuet at the black debutante ball; and Minerva, the voodoo priestess who works her magic in the graveyard at midnight.
These and other Savannahians act as a Greek chorus, with Berendt revealing the alliances, hostilities, and intrigues that thrive in a town where everyone knows everyone else. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil: A Savannah Story is a sublime and seductive reading experience. Brilliantly conceived and masterfully written, this enormously engaging portrait of a most beguiling Southern city is certain to become a modern classic.
I fell in love with Savannah after reading this book and so I had to visit the city.
Savannah is one of the most beautiful cities in the U.S. If you've never been there, it is an absolute must to visit.
Eden CloseBy Anita Shreve1989 |  |
A compelling tale of edgy, small-town emotions, lingering obsession, and romantic salvation.
Andrew, after many years, returns to his hometown to attend his mother's funeral. Planning to remain only a few days, he is drawn into the tragic legacy of his childhood friend and beautiful girl next door, Eden Close.
An adopted child, Eden had learned to avoid the mother who did not want her and to please the father who did. She also aimed to please Andrew and his friends, first by being one of the boys and later by seducing them. Then one hot night, Andrew was awakened by gunshots and piercing screams from the next farm: Mr. Close had been killed and Eden blinded. Now, seventeen years later, Andrew begins to uncover the grisly story - to unravel the layers of thwarted love between the husband, wife, and tormented girl. And as the truth about Eden's past comes to light, so too does Andrew's strange and binding attachment to her reveal itself.
Breakheart HillBy Thomas H. Cook1995 |  |
From the author hailed as "an important talent, a storytelling writer of poetic narrative power" (Los Angeles Times Book Review) comes a dazzling novel of psychological suspense. "This is the darkest story I've ever heard." With these haunting words, Thomas H. Cook begins a tale of love and its aftermath, of a town sent reeling from a moment of passionate betrayal. At its center was Kelli Troy and the town of Choctaw, Alabama. And on one hazy summer afternoon decades ago, a searing burst of violence engulfed Breakheart Hill. For one man who knows the truth about those shattering events, it is a memory that would become his awful secret.
Note: An unforgettable book *
Down RiverBy John Hart2007 |  |
Adam Chase is passionate and misunderstood, a fighter. When narrowly acquitted of a murder charge, he disappears for five long years: not a clue, not a trace. Now, he's back and nobody knows why--not his family or the cops, not the women he left behind. But Adam has his reasons. When more bodies surface, Adam must unravel a web of deceit and violence so dense it staggers the imagination. Old secrets rise, lives collapse, and more than one person crosses the brink as author Hart probes the timeless, destructive power of deception and vengeance.
To Kill A MockingbirdBy Harper Lee1960 |  |
The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it.
To Kill a Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award winning film, also a classic.
Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, To Kill a Mockingbird takes readers to the roots of human behavior - to innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humor and pathos.
Now with over 15 million copies in print and translated into ten languages, this regional story by a young Alabama woman claims universal appeal. Harper Lee always considered her book to be a simple love story. Today it is regarded as a masterpiece of American literature.
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