Southern

Sweet tea in book form

Midnight at the Blackbird Cafe by Heather Webber

July 19, 2019 by Nyx Leave a Comment

With three days to go before vacation I had nothing lined up for my annual beach read. Thankfully, right before I left I received an ARC copy of Heather Webber’s new book Midnight at the Blackbird Cafe. Many of us are familiar with the source material of that is at the kernel of this novel. All you need to do is search the section of your brain that stores childhood nursery rhymes and up will pop the following: “Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rye; four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie! When the pie was […]

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Midnight at the Blackbird Cafe by Heather Webber

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7/19/2019 | Nyx's CBR11 Review No:5 |

A Southern Gothic fail

Lookaway, Lookaway by Wilton Barnhardt

July 31, 2017 by The Mama Leave a Comment

This was a weird book. I mean, a lot of so-called Southern literature is weird – that’s why I love it so – but even by those standards, this was a weird book. Jerene Jarivs Johnston is old money Charlotte. Jerene’s brother is the stereotypical boozy washed up novelist, found most afternoons at the bar at the club sipping his bourbon neat, her sister Dillard is a near shut-in, and her husband Duke is a failed politician, his career having been derailed by Jerene herself when she uncovered Duke’s propensity for bedding younger women. Her children are equally a mess: […]

7/31/2017 The Mama's CBR9 Review No:7 |

Sweet Sequel to a Sweet Family Debut

First Frost by Sarah Addison Allen

February 16, 2017 by ardaigle Leave a Comment

I first fell for the Waverly Family in Allen’s debut novel, “Garden Spells.” Small town living, sisters, baking, luuurv, and a magical apple tree that throws apples at innocent bystanders. What’s not to love? I knew that the sequel would be a good read for the winter time, something light fluffy, and a little warm for the cold days, and it delivered. The Waverly sisters have both made their way home and are living happy lives. The book picks up about 10 years after the first. The sisters are both happily married, living seemingly idyllic lives, but each is preoccupied: […]

2/16/2017 ardaigle's CBR9 Review No:4 |

Home Is Where the Heart Is…

A Land More Kind Than Home by Wiley Cash

February 9, 2017 by The Mama Leave a Comment

The library bookstore is my secret addiction. I don’t get to go often (at least, not in my county, what with the powers that be cutting library hours to a ridiculous degree), but when I do go, I load up. And I would say that of the books I pick up, I have about a 50% success rate. I donate the rest back, which results in a vicious circle where I’ve been known to re-buy previous rejects. (Yeah, I know.) Anyway, of that 50% success rate, about half of those are guilty pleasure romance novels that are easily read but […]

2/9/2017 The Mama's CBR9 Review No:3 |

No one in the South ever asks if you have crazy people in your family. They just ask what side they’re on.

Crazy in Alabama by Mark Childress

August 25, 2016 by The Mama 3 Comments

When I was little, my mother had an avocado green Tupperware bowl. She also had a red one and a harvest gold one, and I’m pretty sure there was a blue one, too. They were different sizes, but they all had lids that had a translucent sort of flower pattern on top, so they were obviously part of a set. The bowl itself was also translucent, and more often than not, the green Tupperware bowl sat on the second shelf of our fridge with bunches of green grapes inside. So when Peejoe’s aunt Lucille showed up at his grandmother’s with […]

8/25/2016 The Mama's CBR8 Review No:43 |

Mississippi Burning

Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

July 25, 2016 by The Mama 3 Comments

I downloaded Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter on a whim from the library’s website, mainly because I liked the cover, but I’m also a sucker for anything set in the South, and this novel didn’t disappoint. After having finished it, I found a paperback copy at the library bookshop and picked it up for JB, who not only really enjoyed it, but passed it off to his dad, which is just about the highest praise a book can receive. Twenty-five years ago, Silas (“32”) Jones and Larry Ott were the best of friends, despite one being the black son of a […]

7/25/2016 The Mama's CBR8 Review No:26 |

The Sins of the Father…

Father and Son by Larry Brown

May 11, 2015 by The Mama Leave a Comment

Set in rural 1960s Mississippi, Father and Son spans a week in a small town after one of their own, Glen Davis, returns from three years in the state penitentiary for running over and killing a young boy while driving drunk. Glen is angry, furious, and the reader senses immediately that this is not a man who has learned his lesson. He’s hard-edged, cold and disconnected, and there is no redeeming quality in him. Glen returns to an elderly father intent on drinking himself to death, a former lover, Jewel, for whom he has very little feelings, a bastard four […]

5/11/2015 The Mama's CBR7 Review No:19 |

Peaches are really just hairy nectarines…

The Peach Keeper by Sarah Addison Allen

April 13, 2015 by The Mama Leave a Comment

I downloaded this from the local library the other day so I would have something to listen to while I walked in the evenings. (Even though it feels like it’s 90 degrees already and it’s only April. What am I going to do when it’s August???) Anyway, I needed something sort of fluffy and chick lit-esque that I could sort of half listen to while I huffed and puffed my way through the soup that is known as Florida air and I thought this would fit the bill. The Peach Keeper tells the interwoven story of two thirty-something women living […]

4/13/2015 The Mama's CBR7 Review No:12 |

narfna on Do Tell – Submit Your Best and Worst Books of CBR11!I have to wait as long as possible to submit this because last year I read two of my favorite books of the year immediately...
narfna on Burn, baby, burn.I read this in prep for The Institute, and I was surprised by how much I liked it! I was expecting something different, I think....
kittenkong42 on Can I adopt a Murderbot please?Thanks for the recommendation! I'll try and have a listen
Mrs. Julien on As I’ve Said. Born Romantic.Phew!
emmalita on Can I adopt a Murderbot please?I love that you love Murderbot! If you get a chance, Kevin R. Free’s narration of the audio books is top notch.

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