Looking on the Good Side

Part of me wanted to spend the nation’s 250th birthday listening to patriotic music, watching fireworks, eating hot dogs, and reflecting on the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of…

It was Monday morning, it was snowing, and for me, it was good writing weather. I’m not sure why exactly. Mostly, it was a feeling. One stemming from the calm…

Other than I sometimes spend a few moments looking for four-leaf clovers while I’m outside with my dog Gracie, this post has nothing to do with clover. It has a…

There is a scene in my novel Found in Pieces where Pearl Goodbar, the story’s main character, gets to hear two of her journalism role models speak at an event…

While I was writing Found in Pieces—my second novel about the 1950s South—no one asked me why I chose a woman newspaper editor as the main character. But if they…

If you love animals and the special bonds that form between them and humans, or if you simply need a reminder that love and kindness still exist in our topsy-turvy…

Several times in recent days I’ve been asked why, as a historian, I haven’t had more to say on social media about current social and political issues and events, particularly…

I realize that lots of people like year-end list-making, but I’m more than a little ambivalent about it. Seems like there’s way too much of it—ten best movies, twenty best…

What can social movements of the past teach us about today’s socially charged climate? Within the past year, my novel South of Little Rock has received four regional and social-issue…

While mowing my back yard one day last summer, I got to thinking about cemeteries. And not because our lot backs up to one—or to get technical, a memorial park….