Do you just love the creepy, atmospheric novels set in the south? Where clinging wisteria vines smother moldering plantation houses and hide the rotting wood beneath. Where the characters are trying to keep up appearances but beneath the surface, secrets and corruption lurk.
What if you’ve already read all of the classics by Faulkner, McCullers, O’Connor, and their ilk, and you’d like to read some books with a new spin on an old, classic subgenre? Well, you’re in luck. Below are some of the contemporary southern gothic novels in the NLS collection.
| BASTARD OUT OF CAROLINA by Dorothy Allison (DB 39353) |
| CHILD OF GOD by Cormac McCarthy (DB 61930, BR 10633) |
| DEMON COPPERHEAD by Barbara Kingsolver (DB 110786, LB 14284) |
| DEVIL ALL THE TIME by Donald Ray Pollock (DB 74278) |
| FAY by Larry Brown (DB 51786) |
| HACIENDA by Isabel Cañas (DB 107997) |
| HEAVEN OF MERCURY by Brad Watson (DB 57135) |
| IF THE CREEK DON’T RISE by Leah Weiss (DB 91901) |
| LAND MORE KIND THAN HOME by Wiley Cash (DB 102621) |
| LITTLE FRIEND by Donna Tartt (DB 55856) |
| LOST COUNTRY by William Gay (DB 97646) |
| MEXICAN GOTHIC by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (DB 99404, BR 23483) |
| MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL: A SAVANNAH STORY by John Berendt (DB 38077, BR 11463, LB 04494) |
| RUBY by Cynthia Bond (DB 81110, BRG 03613) |
| SERENA by Ron Rash (DB 68405, BRG 03689) |
| SING, UNBURIED, SING: A NOVEL by Jesmyn Ward (DB 89552, BR 22096) |
| SWAMPLANDIA by Karen Russell (DB 72823, LB 06768) |
| THOUSAND FALLING CROWS by Larry D. Sweazy (DBC 26472) |
| VINE THAT ATE THE SOUTH: A NOVEL by J. D. Wilkes (DB 94173) |
| WEIGHT OF BLOOD by Laura McHugh (DB 79247) |
| WHEN WE WERE ANIMALS by Joshua A. Gaylord (DB 81361) |