Anthologies

This collection of thirty Southern writers gathers some of the finest authors in the country—with stories, essays, and a poem. Demonstrating a range of styles, topics, and themes these stories display each writer’s craftsmanship and talent and together form a testament to the grand literary tradition of the South. About the Editor Sonny Brewer owns Over the Transom Bookstore in Fairhope, Alabama. He was editor of the city magazine in Mobile, Alabama, associate editor of an Alabama weekly newspaper, and a feature columnist; he edited an anthology of Fairhope writers and artists called Red Bluff Review, and is the author of a parable on aging cleverly disguised as a children’s book, Rembrandt the Rocker, and a book of dime-store philosophy called A Yin for Change. Contributors: Marlin Barton Rick Bragg Jill Conner Browne C. Terry Cline, Jr. Pat Conroy Tom Corcoran Beth Ann Fennelly Patricia Foster Tom Franklin William Gay Jim Gilbert W.E.B. Griffin Winston Groom Melinda Haynes Frank Turner Hollon Silas House Suzanne Hudson Douglas Kelley Tom Kelly Michael Knight Bev Marshall Jennifer Paddock Barbara Robinette Moss Judith Richards Richard Shackelford George Singleton Monroe Thompson Sidney Thompson Brad Watson Steve Yarbrough

Presents a collection of short stories from such authors as Tom Franklin, Donald Hays, Suzanne Hudson, and Michelle Richmond.

As the popular Blue Moon Café series moves into its third volume, The Alumni Grill showcases award-winning veterans from the first two Blue Moon Café collections, handpicked by editors William Gay and Suzanne Kingsbury. In this stunning anthology of Southern prose and poetry, beloved authors such as Tom Franklin, Suzanne Hudson, and Brad Watson take us from the Deep South of Alabama, through backcountry Mississippi, to the hills of Appalachia. We feel the aftermath of murder, marvel at motherhood, taste sumptuous Southern cooking, stay out all night fishing, and ache from lost love. For fans of the Blue Moon Café series and anyone who loves short fiction, The Alumni Grill highlights the endlessly rich and varied voices of the South.

The third volume of Stories from the Blue Moon Café presents a selection of the most talented practitioners of Southern writing, including Rick Bragg, Tim Gautreaux, William Gay, and Daniel Wallace.

“In twenty-nine separate but ingenious ways, these stories seek permanent residence within a reader. They strive to become an emotional or intellectual cargo that might accompany us wherever, or however, we go. . . . If we are made by what we read, if language truly builds people into what they are, how they think, the depth with which they feel, then these stories are, to me, premium material for that construction project. You could build a civilization with them.” —Ben Marcus, from the Introduction Award-winning author of Notable American Women Ben Marcus brings us this engaging and comprehensive collection of short stories that explore the stylistic variety of the medium in America today. Sea Oak by George Saunders Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned by Wells Tower Do Not Disturb by A.M. Homes The Girl in the Flammable Skirt by Aimee Bender The Caretaker by Anthony Doerr The Old Dictionary by Lydia Davis The Father’s Blessing by Mary Caponegro The Life and Work of Alphonse Kauders by Aleksandar Hemon People Shouldn’t Have to be the Ones to Tell You by Gary Lutz Histories of the Undead by Kate Braverman When Mr. Pirzada Came to Dine by Jhumpa Lahiri Down the Road by Stephen Dixon X Number of Possibilities by Joanna Scott Tiny, Smiling Daddy by Mary Gaitskill Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace The Sound Gun by Matthew Derby Short Talks by Anne Carson Field Events by Rick Bass Scarliotti and the Sinkhole by Padgett Powell

Rick Bragg. Tim Gautreaux. William Gay. Fannie Flagg. Diane McWhorter. Charles Simic. Daniel Wallace. Steve Yarbrough. These are just a handful of the acclaimed writers whose work has appeared in the Stories from the Blue Moon Café series since its 2002 inception. Now, in Cast of Characters and Other Stories , the fifth installment of the series, Sonny Brewer has selected a new crop of fiction promising to satisfy even the most discerning of tastes. This dynamic collection of fourteen short stories is a must-read, offering the best in contemporary Southern writing and a glimpse into the future of Southern literature.

The authors in Don't Quit Your Day Job have tried their hands at some of the same jobs as their readers. They’ve worked on the railroad, busted rocks with a sledgehammer, fought fires, wiped tables, soldiered and carpentered and spied, delivered pizzas, lacquered boat paddles, counted heads for the church, sold underwear, delivered mail, and driven garbage trucks. And like William Faulkner before them, they have quit those day jobs. These authors tell good tales — this is the book for those who wonder what work preceded the literary efforts of their favorite authors. This collection allows writers to build a bridge between themselves and their readers, connecting with those who love to read and those who dream about writing while on the job during the day.

This collection of thirty-eight terrifying tales of serial killers at large, written by the great masters of the genre, plumbs the horrifying depths of a deranged mind and the forces of evil that compel a human being to murder, gruesomely and methodically, over and over again. From Hannibal Lecter ( The Silence of the Lambs ) to Patrick Bateman ( American Psycho ), stories of serial killers and psychos loom large and menacing in our collective psyche. Tales of their grisly conquests have kept us cowering under the covers, but still turning the pages. Psychos is the first book to collect in a single volume the scariest and most well-crafted fictional works about these deranged killers. Some of the stories are classics, the best that the genre has to offer, by renowned writers such as Neil Gaiman , Amelia Beamer , Robert Bloch , and Thomas Harris . Other selections are from the latest and most promising crop of new authors. John Skipp, who is also the editor of Zombies , Demons and Werewolves and Shapeshifters , provides fascinating insight, through two nonfiction essays, into our insatiable obsession with serial killers and how these madmen are portrayed in popular culture. Resources at the end of the book includes lists of the genre's best long-form fiction, movies, websites, and writers.