The Half-Mammals of Dixie: Stories - Softcover

Singleton, George

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0156028581 ISBN 13: 9780156028585

Publisher: Mariner Books, 2003

Synopsis

This second collection of short stories by a bright star in Southern fiction showcases a town so tiny it missed the map, the gleefully off-the-wall Southerners who refuse to be pigeonholed, and a South far removed from big-city Atlanta and proper Charleston. As the author says of his characters, "They're regular people just trying to get by." Among them: a boy whose reputation is ruined when he appears in a head-lice documentary; a lovelorn father who woos his third-grader's teacher with creative show-and-tells; and a former pharmaceuticals salesman who waits for the word of God to tell him what to paint on next the "primitive" canvases he sells for big bucks to an art dealer.

About this title

Review:

PRAISE FOR THE HALF-MAMMALS OF DIXIE
"A miasma of flea markets, palm readers, bowling alleys, and alligators, offering a disturbingly askew-at times, downright surreal-vision of the South."-Entertainment Weekly

"When was the last time you sat reading, in a beach chair, and started laughing out loud? . . . George Singleton keeps the humor volume on high."-The Seattle Times

From the Back Cover:

A BOOK MAGAZINE Best Short Story Collection of the Year
In a South far removed from big-city Atlanta and proper Charleston is a town so tiny it missed the map: Forty-Five, South Carolina. Here a boy's reputation is ruined forever when he stars in an educational documentary about head lice; a former pharmaceuticals salesman waits for the word of God to tell him what to paint; a single dad woos a teacher with the show-and-tell objects he sends to school with his son; and motivational speakers, aquarium salesmen, flea-market shoppers, and palm readers mingle with hilarious results.
Overlooked, underappreciated, and funnier than a potbellied pig on a leash, the residents of Forty-Five are utterly impossible to forget.
"Relentlessly offbeat . . . A disturbingly askew-at times, downright surreal-vision of the South."-Entertainment Weekly
"Singleton's voice comes off like that of a brilliant barfly, who occasionally suffers from the clairvoyance of madness."-The Times-Picayune (New Orleans)
"Sly, intelligent, hilarious."-The Charlotte Observer
George Singleton has been published in the Atlantic Monthly, Harper's, Playboy, and Zoetrope. The author of the short-story collection These People Are Us, he teaches writing at South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts and Humanities and lives in Pickens County, South Carolina.

About this edition

• Publisher: Mariner Books
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0156028581
• ISBN 13: 9780156028585
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256