The home where Wilma Dykeman (1920-2006) grew up has been donated to the University of North Carolina at Asheville to implement an expanded Writers-in-Residence Program. The eleven-acre property is located near the head of Beaverdam Valley just north of Asheville. Authors will live in the residence for varying periods of time – from a semester to a week-end. The program will include workshops, public lectures and course offerings. It will “support both the craft of writing and the interdisciplinary topics of enduring interest to Wilma Dykeman during her lifetime, including but not limited to the environment, social change, human relations, economics, biology, civil discourse, racial justice and women’s rights.”
Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi was # 3 on the New York Times hardcover fiction list for the week of September 20,# 6 for the week of October 27th and #13 the week of October 4th. The author grew up in Huntsville, Alabama, one of the settings of the novel. It was one of eleven new books recommended by The New York Times on September 17 for the week.
The Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance list of their fall 2020 Okra Picks includes Make Me Rain by Nikki Giovanni and She Come By It Natural: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs by Sarah Smarsh and How Fire Runs by Charles Dodd White.
Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi was named on of Time magazine’s 42 Most Anticipated Books of Fall 2020 and Get Literary’s 32 Most Anticipated New Reads of Fall 2020 and Literary Hubb’s Ultimate Fall 2020 Books Previ
She Come By It Natural: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs by Sarah Smarsh is also a current Amazon Editor’s pick and one of Book Page’s most anticipated books of Fall 2020 and one of Get Literary’s 32 Most Anticipated New Reads of Fall, 2020 and Lit Hub’s Ultimate Fall 2020 Books Preview
The American Book Awards this year gave their Criticism Award to Appalachian Reckoning: A Region Responds to Hillbilly Elegy by Meredith McCarroll and Anthony Harkins