COLUMNS & DEPARTMENTS

Editor’s Box
by Marc Smirnoff

Messages from the Front 
Delivering the motley South to your doorstep!
with Paul Maliszewski, Emily Witt, Lawrence Wilson

OA Comix:
Sammy's World
by Kristin Gore (writer) and Ellen Forney (artist)

Gone Off Up North:
Where's the Big Idea?
by Roy Blount, Jr.

Saying It:
Don't Try This at Home
by Kaye Gibbons

Local Fare:
Piggly Wiggly Ain't No Hoggly Woggly
by John T. Edge

The Future:
Change in the Delta
by Matt Dellinger

Sense of Place:
Tri-County Fair—Petersburg, West Virginia 
Photographs by Mary Noble Ours

The Moviegoer:
Life Studies
by Gary Hawkins

Guest Music Column:
The Worst Form of Imitation?
by Will Blythe

Writing on Writing:
A Kind of Mystery 
by Kevin Brockmeier

Writing on Writing:
The Wind Bloweth Where It Listeth
by Charles Portis

Dealer’s Choice:
Son of a Preacher Man
Marshall Frady (1940–2004)
by Hal Crowther

Books:
Faulkner as Racist
by Marc Smirnoff

Books:
St. Cassius
by Paul Reyes

Southern Reader:
Roughhousing in the Southern Library
by J.B. Slogan

Southern Scenes:
Walnut Glen, West Virginia
Photo by Mary Noble Ours

Poetry:
Brucker Alone
by Rob Griffith

FEATURES

Love and Death in the Cape Fear Serpentarium
Some passions are more dangerous than others.
by Wendy Brenner

The Kindest Cut
A Civil War surgeon carves a place in one family’s history.
A story by Judy Budnitz

Christ in the Room
The author’s life after seeing Jesus.
by Barry Hannah

Are You Ready to be Seen?
What should a frustrated writer do if his main competition is his best friend?
A story by Jennifer S. Davis

Hidden Meanings
A college student turns in a no-holds-barred homework assignment.
A short story by Michael Parker

King Volcano
Intimate encounters on a Hawaiian island.
A short story by Carol Ann Fitzgerald

Cover: Photo by Mary Noble Ours