Novelist Mark Childress ("Crazy in Alabama," "Georgia Bottoms") happened to be born in Monroeville, Alabama – the town Harper Lee called Maycomb when she wrote about it in the classic "To Kill a Mockingbird." For years, as a journalist, Childress was told to pursue an interview with the famously reclusive author, who refused all entreaties. The first essay describes the importance of Harper Lee's novel to the Southern fiction of today, and explores the question of why Harper Lee prefers to...

Reviews:ENTHRALLING AND DELIGHTFUL...RICH AND COMPELLING...What might at first have seemed a gently paced coming-of-age story turns into a rambunctious tale.”—The Christian Science Monitor“With a marvelous ear for language and devilishly rich imagination, Mark Childress has crafted an engaging and readable novel.”—The Boston Globe“Childress knows the business of words. His descriptions evoke a sense of time and place that rings true.... A rare talent.”...

Tender is the novel of the greatest rock-and-roll star the world has ever seen. It's so intimate and so powerful a story, it has to be fiction.This is the story of Leroy Kirby, a poor white boy from Tupelo, Mississippi, who moves to Memphis, finds his voice, and transforms himself -- in one remarkable year -- from a guitar-picking truck driver to the most famous rock-and-roll singer in the world. It is one of America's essential and enduring legends, brought to life through the ima...

In two short essays and one long piece of reportage, author and screenwriter Mark Childress ("Crazy in Alabama," "One Mississippi," "Georgia Bottoms") explores New Orleans before, during, and after Katrina. Essays: "What It Means to Miss New Orleans" originally appeared in the New York Times, "Disaster Tourism" in Salon magazine, and "The Tragic City Laughs" in The Birmingham News. All proceeds go to Habitat for Humanity. Approximately 10,000 words, with illustrations.

“Mark Childress’ puncture-sharp wit kept me sane during the Trumpian days of torment. What joy to have the complete compendium of horrors, delivered in the form of pure literary genius. The perfect alternative to Xanax or Zen meditation.” – Amy Tan, author of The Joy Luck Club and Where the Past Begins“You, sir, are a libtard.”– Glenn Beck“I love every word Mark Childress writes, including this new compilation of his great political writing ... brilliant and hilariou...

A man who can't pronounce "anonymous"In high office seems rather ominous.We don't have to get all Deuteronomous:Brains and power are rarely synonymous.""I love every word Mark Childress writes, including this new compilation of his great political writing. He is brilliant and hilarious. " - Anne Lamott"You, sir, are a libtard!" - Glenn Beck.New York Times bestselling author Mark Childress was like many liberal Americans whose life veered off ...

Georgia Bottoms is known in her small community of Six Points, Alabama, as a beautiful, well-to-do, and devoutly Baptist Southern belle.Nobody realizes that the family fortune has long since disappeared, and a determinedly single woman like Georgia needs an alternative, and discreet, means of income. In Georgia's case it is six well-heeled lovers -- one for each day of the week, with Mondays off -- none of whom knows about the others.But when the married preacher who has be...

A bestselling author "eloquently addresses racism . . .adolescent love, family dysfunction . . .with plenty of wit and insight" in this coming of age novel ( Booklist ).You need only one best friend, Daniel Musgrove figures, to make it through high school alive. After his family moves to Mississippi just before his junior year, Daniel finds fellow outsider Tim Cousins. The two become inseparable, sharing a fascination with...

A best-selling author of books for adults and children, Mark Childress pens his most outrageous work yet with Georgia Bottoms. The titular heroine is the epitome of the church-going Southern belle, except for one teeny-tiny aspect of her life. Georgia's family inheritance has long since evaporated, and to maintain her genteel lifestyle, Miss Bottoms has taken six affluent lovers-the fly in the ointment being that one is a married preacher who's about to reveal their infidelity to the whole...

Mark Childress is the author of the New York Times best-seller Crazy in Alabama. Here he again turns his keen literary eye to smalltown Southern living. Yankee transplant Daniel Musgrove can't seem to fit in at his Mississippi high school. When he meets fellow outsider Tim Cousins, things look up. Then the two boys' battles with a local bully escalate into a violent act that rocks the town. "Childress eloquently addresses racism, tentative adolescent love, family dysfunction ... with plent...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERIt’s the dubious distinction of thirty-year-old Willa Jackson to hail from a fine old Southern family of means that met with financial ruin generations ago. The Blue Ridge Madam—built by Willa’s great-great-grandfather and once the finest home in Walls of Water, North Carolina—has stood for years as a monument to misfortune and scandal. Willa has lately learned that an old classmate—socialite Paxton Osgood—has restored the house to...

“The classic trifecta of talent, heart, and a bone-deep sense of storytelling….A masterful performance, deftly rendered and deeply satisfying. For days on end, I woke with this story on my mind.” —David WroblewskiA powerful and resonant novel from the critically acclaimed author of Smonk and Hell at the Breech, Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter tells the riveting story of two boyhood friends, torn apart by circumstance, who are broug...