Southern Memoirs

At dusk, on a warm evening in 2016, a group of 40 men gathered in the corner of a dusty field on a farm outside Parys in the Free State. Some were in fury. Others treated the whole thing as a joke - a game. The events of the next two hours would come to haunt them all. They would rip families apart, prompt suicide attempts, breakdowns, divorce, bankruptcy, threats of violent revenge and acts of unforgivable treachery. These Are Not Gentle People is the story of that night and of what happened next.

Most familiar with the Wild West know Wyatt Earp, Virgil Earp, and Morgan Earp for the famous shootout on the streets of Tombstone, Arizona. But few know the later years of the close-knit Earp family, which revolved around patriarch Nicholas Earp, and their last push at a major monetary coup in Los Angeles.

This book is a roller coaster of self-induced situations my friends and I found ourselves in over the years. Our immediate goal was simple.... Take it as far as we could to the next level and still wake up the next day. Of course, after a while, we didn't care if we woke up or not. Join me as I take you on a journey into nothingness...a journey into the depths of intoxication at its best and worst. Follow me as I show you what life was like for some small-town Southern boys and how we managed to finally find our way out of the situations we so often enjoyed finding.

Before you listen to any of this book, Jimmie asks your permission to speak freely. If you wear your feelings on your sleeves, he asks you to go topless. Now grab a beverage of your choice, sit back, and let's experience life in the Deep South through the eyes of a Black man. This book takes both prose and poetry and walks you through life experiences and living in a culture where color still makes a difference.

People love and remember the novels of Bobbie Ann Mason because they ring so true. This dazzling memoir has the same power. In it, Mason tells the story of her own family - a multilayered saga of three generations, their aspirations, their conflicts, and the ties that bound them to one another.

In thinking about her native land, Julia Reed quotes another Southern writer, Willie Morris, who said, “It’s the juxtapositions that get you down here.” These juxtapositions are, for Julia Reed, the soul of the South and in her warmhearted and funny new audiobook, South Toward Home, she chronicles her adventures through the highs and the lows of Southern life - the Delta hot tamale festival, a masked ball, a rollicking party in a boat on a sand bar, scary Christian billboards, and the southern affection for the lowly possum.

Mixing memoir, a wellness program, and inspirational advice, Randy Jackson's book is a work of personal passion.

The American Idol judge's struggles with his health and weight have been well - documented; he's tried every diet, spent countless hours in gyms, and even had gastric bypass surgery in 2003. Now, he's taken all that he's learned throughout these trials and codified their strengths into an easy-to-follow, super-useful maintenance regimen, filled with meal plans and exercise routines.

In Snippets of Truths, author Mary Hardy shares the stories of her youth while growing up in rural Southern Mississippi in the '50s and '60s. A collection of anecdotes and vignettes, this memoir narrates the memorable experiences of Hardy's childhood. From the large to the small, and from the ordinary and everyday to the remarkable, Snippets of Truths recalls a wide array of events living on a farm, working in the fields, attending school, participating as a majorette, becoming homecoming queen, making homemade ice cream, and creating dolls out of Coca Cola bottles.

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.

This is the life story of Pierre Charette, who became a key figure in the war on drugs in the United States and Europe. His adventures span a heart-pounding 33 years as a police officer, undercover detective, federal DEA agent. It includes some of the most famous cases ever developed by this agent. His investigative ability and imagination took him into the French criminal underworld, behind the Iron Curtain and all over the planet. He supervised, and with his agent solved the largest cocaine conspiracy in US history.

The story of the intelligence war in South Africa during the Second World War is one of suspense, drama and dogged persistence. In 1939, when the Union of South Africa entered the war on Britain’s side, the German government secretly contacted the political opposition, and the leadership of the anti-war movement, the Ossewabrandwag. The Nazis’ aim was to spread sedition, undermine the Allied war effort, and - given the strategic importance of the Cape of Good Hope sea route - gain naval intelligence. Soon U-boat packs were sent to operate in South African waters, to deadly effect.

After an arduous overland journey, Levi Scott and his son John arrived in Oregon City in November 1844. Scott joined the Jesse Applegate's 1846 expedition seeking a better, safer way through the Cascades to the Willamette Valley. Their new southern route wound through the Umpqua Valley, three mountain ranges, and the Black Rock Desert before meeting the established California Trail.

Lee St. John is a she-devil with a halo, a Southern Belle who doesn't play by the rules, and a prankster setting her next trap. But like a train wreck, we can't help but peek at her shenanigans. She is just plain naughty but with a heart. The mementos found in her closet, attic, basement, and even her school classroom unleash her secrets about mothers, husbands, former boyfriends, children, friends, jobs, families, students, and more.

From his humble beginnings in Sumter, South Carolina, to his prominence on the Washington, D.C., political scene as the third highest-ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives, U.S. Congressman James E. Clyburn has led an extraordinary life. In Blessed Experiences, Clyburn tells in his own inspirational words how an African-American boy from the Jim Crow-era South was able to beat the odds to achieve great success.

You may think you know the butter-loving, finger-licking, joke-cracking, queen of melt-in-your-mouth Southern cuisine. You may have even heard some version of her Cinderella story: she was a single mom with two teenaged sons when she started a brown-bag lunch business with $200 and wound up with a thriving restaurant business, a fairy-tale second marriage, and wildly popular television shows. But you have never heard the intimate details of her often bumpy road to fame and fortune.

A Black woman who suffered the outrages of apartheid - including the murder of her father - shares her outlook on her struggles with humanity and forgiveness.

During the Great Depression, Fred Allen is born poor and hungry in the shadow of rural Georgia’s infamous cotton mills. By the time Fred is three years old, he can play hymns on the piano without missing a note. In kindergarten, he amazes adults with Chopin. Terrified that Fred’s genius is proof of a curse, his parents lock away the piano.

Belle Brezing made a major career move when she stepped off the streets of Lexington, Kentucky, and into Jennie Hill's bawdy house: an upscale brothel run out of a former residence of Mary Todd Lincoln. At 19, Brezing was already infamous as a youth steeped in death, sex, drugs, and scandal.

Come spend Memorial Day at a small city in the Deep South. You may be surprised at what you see and hear. I was.

Baseball, religion, work, death, and the company store - these figured eminently in the lives of Southern cotton mill workers and their families during the early decades of the 20th century. In this firsthand account of his native Bladenboro, North Carolina, George G. Suggs, Jr., captures in rich detail the world of a thriving cotton mill town where the company was dominant but workers had forged a strong community. Here the focus is on the workers - their interests, personalities, and values - in their best and in their darker moments.