Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Best Southern Books

I am participating in the Southern Reading Challenge at Maggie Reads and in the Blog Improvement Project at Sophisticated Dorkiness. I truly enjoy both Maggie's and Kim's blogs, and try to visit there at least once a week (as my blog roll grows, I find that I have more and more blogs I want to visit on a daily basis, but sometimes life gets in the way, but I guess that is the same for a lot of you).

In the Blog Improvement Project it has been Blog Post Bingo for some weeks now - read the full post and the Bingo-list here - a project which ends in two days. I am determined to do as many of the suggested posts as possible, and this is # 3: A list post.
Since I wanted to combine this list with my the Southern Reading Challenge, I have found a list called 125 best Southern Books. You can check out the list here. I don't know who compiled the list or who determined which books made the list or not. And I am not going to publish the full list here.

My list contains the books from the list mentioned above which I have read or have on my TBR.

The Color Purple by Alice Walker (did not read yet)
Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner (did not read yet)
Black Boy by Richard Wright (did not read yet)
Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy (read)
Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons (read) See review here.
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers (read) See review here.
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole (reading)
A Curtain of Green by Eudora Welty (did not read yet)
The Ponder Heart by Eudora Welty (read) See review here.
Uncle Tom's Children by Richard Wright (read)

Did you read any of the books I read? And if you check the full list, how many, if any, did you read from the list. Is there any book with a Southern theme that you think is missing from the list? I would love links to your reviews of Southern lit by the way! I see that I haven't included anything by authors such as Flannery O'Connor, and I never read Gone With the Wind either. Plus there is an awful lot of William Faulkner, which sounds tempting....oh well, so many books, so little time ;o)

3 comments:

Beth F said...

I seem to have dropped out of the BIP -- I'll have to get back into it.

Anyway, I think I've told you this before, but I love your list of books for the Southern Reading Challenge.

I haven't read Ellen Foster or Uncle Tom's Children. And I'm not sure if I read Curtain of Green because it doesn't sound very familiar.

Julia Phillips Smith said...

From the full list, I've read:

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings - Maya Angelou

Roots - Alex Haley

I've also read Gone With the Wind.

I'm continuing with the BIP, although I haven't posted updates as regularly. The last update I did included 4 updates grouped together. But I'm loving the project and I'm so glad Kim started it.

Care said...

Great list! I 've read the Heart is a Lonely Hunter (and enjoyed the movie, too.) I would like to re-read some Faulkner someday but I won't be upset if I just never do.