Southern Fiction Humor

Harper Kirkpatrick is not what Cameron Bennett expects for the bachelor party in his Savannah mansion. She's desperate when he sends her home in her cat costume. Jobs are scarce and eviction looms. Former boyfriend Billy took off for California and she's too proud to head home to Chicago. Although Cameron may not go for her cheerleader kicks, he does admire Harper's spunk. When she answers his ad for a nanny, she's horrified to find herself back at his mansion.

Beginning with a house fire the day after Christmas, through the dark and haunted halls of an old Arkansas mansion, to the exciting end in a deadly battle in a dark and dusty Memphis pasture, Me, Boo and the Goob: A Southern Adventure is the hilarious story of three boys struggling to make sense of the adult world. Filled with only the purest of ambitions, the boys careen from mishap to mishap in a story that is as endearing as it is funny.

Cain’t Do Nothing with Love was the winner of the CIPA EVVY Audio Book Award 2014. All stories treat the most difficult topics - death, religion, family - with sharp humor and urgent respect.

Highly educated millennial David Harper is adrift. He is also the pastor’s son. Or he was, until his father dropped dead in the pulpit. When David learns his widowed mother is in danger of losing the roof over her head, he surprises everyone, most of all himself, and steps in to fill his father’s shoes.

"When Poppy Wainwright's grandmother dies, she travels from her home in Arkansas to live with her grandmother's older sister, Sookie, in Savannah, Georgia. 'Your Grandma Lainey was a self-righteous nit-wit,' Sookie tells Poppy upon their first meeting, 'and if I had the gumption, I'd drive myself up to Mountain Home and spit on her freshly dug grave.' Sookie is everything Poppy's grandmother was not: atheistic, slovenly, suspicious, prone to vendettas, and completely lacking any verbal filter." (Kirkus Reviews)

Dr. Frederick Eichner, world-renowned dermatologist, is visited by the entrancingly irritating Felix Treevly who comes to him as a patient and stays as an obsession. Prosaic incidents blossom into bizarre developments with the sharpened reality of dreams as the spectral Mr. Treevly leads the doctor into a series of increasingly weird situations. With the assistance of a drunken private detective, a mad judge, a car crash, a game show called What’s My Disease, and a hashish party, Treevly drives Eichner to madness and mayhem.

Lady Miss Jacqueline swears that hair makes a difference. And it does! Now Janet is taking charge on the job and making moves on a local barista she’s always shied away from. But when her brash new Lady Miss drawl gets all the wrong attention, Janet realizes that she needs to change her style - and her wig. It’s all a matter of finding the perfect fit.

The listener who has grown up in the South will swear that he knows each and every character in these tales - from the "Indian doctor" with the secret hemorrhoid cure to the bull who couldn't keep his "loins" out of reach of the youngster's BB gun; he'll identify with Bubba gigging for Giant Southern Frogs and with the curious cat that burned the cabin down; he'll remember high-school teammates like "Shorty" and "Speedy", as well as college fraternity brothers like "Snake" and "Stud". And he'll laugh while remembering.

For former pushover Janet, her Sophie curls appear to be a balanced and beautiful new addition to her magical, life-changing wig collection. She’s positively beaming, has smoothed out the wrinkles in her personal life, and is embarking on a philanthropic new business venture. Everything is ideal until the unthinkable happens and she has to stand on her own - with a final push from Lady Miss Jacqueline, of course!

After her latest life-altering wig switch, Janet slips into leather leggings, quits her job, goes full advance on her barista crush, and makes a career commitment to her bestie, Candace. The follow-through? Not pretty. With guilt and betrayal hanging over her head (not to mention that dangerous, if fetching, wig), Janet must comb out the mess she’s made. And there’s only one way to do it.

After slipping on Chelsea - a magical wig that comes with a gregarious personality - Janet is making strides at work and has a new friend and a confident strut. Life is fab. Isn’t it? Honestly, there’s something missing. Where’s the adventure? The purpose? What she needs is to tap into her inner daredevil. But her mystical wigmaker has a word of caution: should Janet lose control, it might not be so easy to get it back.

In the South, we believe in being polite, even if it kills us. So, when we just can't fight the urge to say something nasty, we follow it up with a "bless her heart" just to make us feel better. "Look at that poor woman trying to jog around that track. Her rear-end is dragging a trail, bless her heart." Youngblood and Poole talk about the ins and outs of nosy neighbors, sibling rivalry, and why every Southerner worth her salt feels the need to offer advice.

This delightful collection of short stories from acclaimed writer Susan Gabriel (The Secret Sense of Wildflower, a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2012 and an Amazon number one best seller) is rich in humor as well as mystery and meaning. Whether white or black, living or dead, down home country or upscale urban, Gabriel's characters are quirky, poignant, and deep.

Author and professional storyteller Brooke Cox believes sauces from the Lord are all around us. Don’t be misled; this is not a book about food. For the most part, Cox considers these sauces as the basis for stories that equal fun lessons from God. She says these sauces often leak into our lives in the guise of stories that are equipping us to live, not only in our present, but also in our future. In the book, Saucy Southern Stories, Cox shares the zesty sauces the Lord has generously poured onto her quirky tomboy life.

He's a grand guy, that Guy Grand—billionaire by birth, entrepreneur by avocation, and thoroughly unpredictable. He "keeps his hand in", buying into and revolutionizing industries ranging from championship boxing to African safaris. Is he a crackpot, or an eccentric, or perhaps a visionary with a goal of social redemption? Grand's greatest project, his tour de force, the cruise ship Magic Christian, sets sail on Easter Sunday, fully renovated into the most luxurious vessel ever to sail the seas.

The Donkey and the Darling is an infamous parody of children's fairy tales that is classic Terry Southern. Originally a collaboration with painter Larry Rivers, there were only 35 physical copies created of what turned out to be the most expensive and labor-intensive project ever created by University Limited Art Edition. This audio version is a unique, winking performance by Steven Crossley.