The best books about Appalachia

Who picked these books? Meet our 40 experts.

40 authors created a book list connected to Appalachia, and here are their favorite Appalachia books.
Shepherd is reader supported. When you buy books, we may earn an affiliate commission

What type of Appalachia book?

Loading...
Loading...

Uneven Ground

By Ronald D Eller,

Book cover of Uneven Ground: Appalachia since 1945

Melanie Beals Goan Author Of A Simple Justice: Kentucky Women Fight for the Vote

From the list on Kentucky history.

Who am I?

When students ask me if I am from Kentucky, I say “no, but I got here as quickly as I could.”  I chose to make the state my home and raise my family here, and I have studied its history for nearly three decades.  I am drawn to Kentucky’s story and the paradox it represents: on one hand, you have the Derby, rolling hills and pastures, and fine bourbon, but set against that polished, sophisticated image are the stereotypes of a lawless, illiterate, poor state.  As a borderland, not quite north or south, east or west, Kentucky offers a fascinating lens through which to view the nation’s history.    

Melanie's book list on Kentucky history

Discover why each book is one of Melanie's favorite books.

Why did Melanie love this book?

Uneven Ground is a book about Appalachia, but it is also a story of American economic development and a cautionary tale about the failures of capitalism. Eastern Kentucky lies in the heart of central Appalachia, an area rich in resources but home to some of the nation’s poorest people. Eller knows more about the region’s challenges than anyone and he provides a compelling indictment of development narratives that emphasize industrialization and false promises of “progress.” His book offers hope that out-of-the-box thinking and a new definition of “the good life” can lead to healthy and more equitable communities in the mountains. 

By Ronald D Eller,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Uneven Ground as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Appalachia has played a complex and often contradictory role in the unfolding of American history. Created by urban journalists in the years following the Civil War, the idea of Appalachia provided a counterpoint to emerging definitions of progress. Early-twentieth-century critics of modernity saw the region as a remnant of frontier life, a reflection of simpler times that should be preserved and protected. However, supporters of development and of the growth of material production, consumption, and technology decried what they perceived as the isolation and backwardness of the place and sought to "uplift" the mountain people through education and industrialization. Ronald…


Lost Mountain

By Erik Reece,

Book cover of Lost Mountain: A Year in the Vanishing Wilderness: Radical Strip Mining and the Devastation of Appalachia

Jess Barber Author Of Reckoning 2

From the list on climate disaster.

Who am I?

I'm a speculative fiction writer who often works within the genre of "climate fiction." I grew up in southern Appalachia; my hometown is a lovely place, surrounded by the beauty and wildness of the Smoky Mountains. It also happens to be centered around a chemical company where a large portion of the town works, including my father and, for a brief time, myself. I've been fascinated with the dichotomy of nature and industry for a long time, and have spent years exploring these themes in my own work.

Jess' book list on climate disaster

Discover why each book is one of Jess' favorite books.

Why did Jess love this book?

I grew up in southern Appalachia. Every time I fly home to visit my family, I see the scars of mountaintop removal coal mining as the plane begins to descend over the Blue Ridge Mountains. Lost Mountain chronicles the far-reaching effects of this devastating and unethical practice. I truly believe it ought to be required reading for anyone living in America today.

By Erik Reece,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Lost Mountain as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A new form of strip mining has caused a state of emergency for the Appalachian wilderness and the communities that depend on it-a crisis compounded by issues of government neglect, corporate hubris, and class conflict. In this powerful call to arms, Erik Reece chronicles the year he spent witnessing the systematic decimation of a single mountain and offers a landmark defense of a national treasure threatened with extinction.


She Walks These Hills

By Sharyn McCrumb,

Book cover of She Walks These Hills

Leslie Wheeler Author Of Rattlesnake Hill

From the list on where the sense of place becomes a character.

Who am I?

I’m a mystery author from sunny California who moved to New England to be close to my dark roots. Places spark my imagination. As a child, I’d look at a house and wonder, “What would it be like to live there, in that town and that landscape?” On family road trips, my parents fueled my desire for knowledge about different places by reading from the WPA guides to the states. The books I enjoy the most have a strong sense of place. I want my readers to experience my settings as fully as I do. Setting is where a book begins. Characters and story spring from this fertile ground.

Leslie's book list on where the sense of place becomes a character

Discover why each book is one of Leslie's favorite books.

Why did Leslie love this book?

I was drawn to this book because it’s loaded with atmosphere, and features hill folk like I do, with the difference that McCrumb’s characters inhabit the hills of Tennessee, while mine live in the Berkshire Hills of Western Massachusetts. I especially like the way she weaves local lore and legends into the story, and how she reveals how the landscape appears to different characters, ranging from a long-ago woman, kidnapped by Indians who escapes and makes her way homeward, to a modern-day non-hillbilly who struggles to re-create her difficult journey. Then, there’s the way McCrumb adds a dash of the supernatural through a character with psychic powers—all of which have been grist to my fictional mill.

By Sharyn McCrumb,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked She Walks These Hills as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Katie Wyler still crosses Ashe Mountain, and although a few can see her, Deputy Sheriff Martha Ayers doesn't believe in ghosts. Hiram Sorley has escaped after 30 years in prison and he's on his way home to Ashe Mountain. Only Martha seems to understand that Sorley's wife and daughter are in danger.


A Literary Field Guide to Southern Appalachia

By Rose McLarney (editor), Laura-Gray Street (editor), L. L. Gaddy Jr. (editor)

Book cover of A Literary Field Guide to Southern Appalachia

Eric Magrane Author Of The Sonoran Desert: A Literary Field Guide

From the list on looking at field guides and atlases in a new way.

Who am I?

I love field guides. I can vividly picture my first copy of Peterson’s Field Guide to Birds, tattered and weather-beaten. I also love poetry and literature, so it seemed natural to me to bring the two together in my work. I’m from New England, but I've lived in the U.S. Southwest for over twenty years. Place is important to me: I think a lot about how we get to know and care for the places we live and call home and how we can work to be good neighbors. I worked for about a decade as a hiking guide and have also taught environmental education. I now teach geography at New Mexico State University. 

Eric's book list on looking at field guides and atlases in a new way

Discover why each book is one of Eric's favorite books.

Why did Eric love this book?

I remember talking with Laura-Gray Street when they were planning this book, and I love how it turned out! A beautiful mixture of natural history, poetry, and artwork featuring species of the Southern Appalachians. If you live in or care about Southern Appalachia, I’d especially recommend this to you (and it makes a great gift for anyone you know who lives there). 

By Rose McLarney (editor), Laura-Gray Street (editor), L. L. Gaddy Jr. (editor)

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Literary Field Guide to Southern Appalachia as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Getting acquainted with local flora and fauna is the perfect way to begin to understand the wonder of nature. The natural environment of Southern Appalachia, with habitats that span the Blue Ridge to the Cumberland Plateau, is one of the most biodiverse on earth. A Literary Field Guide to Southern Appalachia-a hybrid literary and natural history anthology-showcases sixty of the many species indigenous to the region.

Ecologically, culturally, and artistically, Southern Appalachia is rich in paradox and stereotype-defying complexity. Its species range from the iconic and inveterate-such as the speckled trout, pileated woodpecker, copperhead, and black bear-to the elusive and…


Groundskeeping

By Lee Cole,

Book cover of Groundskeeping

Terry A. Repak Author Of Circling Home: What I Learned by Living Elsewhere

From the list on writers struggling to find their place in the world.

Who am I?

My memoir, Circling Home: What I Learned by Living Elsewhere, details my own trajectory in trying to find my voice and métier as a writer. I’ve kept a journal since I was a teenager, trained to be a journalist in college, and worked as an investigative reporter on a newspaper column and a news show in my twenties. When my husband and I moved abroad, I got a book contract for my PhD thesis and also published my research in academic journals. I wrote travel articles and profiles of people I met while living in East and West Africa. Working with a writing group of friends, I finished two novels before embarking on my memoir.

Terry's book list on writers struggling to find their place in the world

Discover why each book is one of Terry's favorite books.

Why did Terry love this book?

This is a quiet first novel that deals directly with writers’ struggles to find their voices and places in the world.

The main character, an aspiring writer who works as a laborer to pay for classes and for entrée into the literary world, falls in love with a poet who has already won acclaim and doesn’t have to take menial jobs that distract her from her real passion.

Both characters struggle to find their voices and make their ways as writers in a country that doesn’t offer public funding to aspiring artists and writers. Both opt to live modestly in order to pursue their chosen career paths, and ultimately find that they must consider their own career above the other’s.

By Lee Cole,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Groundskeeping as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A TODAY SHOW #ReadWithJenna BOOK CLUB PICK • An indelible love story about two very different people navigating the entanglements of class and identity and coming of age in an America coming apart at the seams—this is "an extraordinary debut about the ties that bind families together and tear them apart across generations" (Ann Patchett, best-selling author of The Dutch House).

In the run-up to the 2016 election, Owen Callahan, an aspiring writer, moves back to Kentucky to live with his Trump-supporting uncle and grandfather. Eager to clean up his act after wasting time and potential in his early twenties,…


The PMS Outlaws

By Sharyn McCrumb,

Book cover of The PMS Outlaws

Larissa Reinhart Author Of Portrait of a Dead Guy

From the list on southern humorous mysteries to make you snort.

Who am I?

My first editor informed me I was a mystery writer and my first mystery conference categorized me as a Southern humorous mystery writer. I didn’t intend to write Southern humorous mysteries but find the world-view of my characters and the world they live in quite comical and southern (my characters and I live in Georgia). I also abhor crime, so the dead bodies that keep appearing in my stories need to be dealt with lightly. I’m happy to be a Wall Street Journal bestselling and international award-winning author with eighteen books and counting in three series, Cherry Tucker Mysteries, Maizie Albright Star Detectives, and Finley Goodhart Crime Capers. 

Larissa's book list on southern humorous mysteries to make you snort

Discover why each book is one of Larissa's favorite books.

Why did Larissa love this book?

Southern Appalachia is as southern as the Cotton Belt, but the Smokies have a culture as unique as the bayou or the western reaches of Texas. Sharyn McCrumb has a wealth of historical knowledge when it comes to the Blue Ridge Appalachians, but she knows mountain folk's minds and motivations even more. McCrumb’s amateur sleuth Elizabeth MacPherson series’ is satirical and wry, full of wit and grit. Rock solid mysteries mired in history and loaded with character. I love them all, but the last is my favorite. The title alone makes me smile.

By Sharyn McCrumb,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The PMS Outlaws as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Bestselling author Sharyn McCrumb, internationally acclaimed for the "quiet fire"* of her Appalachian Ballad novels, clearly has a dark side--a wicked, sardonic wit that has prompted critics to compare her to Jane Austen and Jonathan Swift.

Readers and reviewers alike also have lauded Ms. McCrumb for her inspired chronicles of forensic anthropologist Elizabeth MacPherson. In her newest tale in the MacPherson saga, McCrumb examines society's fascination with beauty--and the deceptiveness of outer appearances. Elizabeth herself, hospitalized for depression over her missing husband, learns that insanity liberates one from polite hypocrisy, enabling a "crazy lady" to remark: "Anorexia is not a…


Another Country

By Christopher Camuto,

Book cover of Another Country: Journeying toward the Cherokee Mountains

John Nolt Author Of A Land Imperiled: The Declining Health of the Southern Appalachian Bioregion

From the list on loss and hope in the southern Appalachian environment.

Who am I?

I moved from Ohio to southern Appalachia in 1978 to take a temporary job teaching philosophy at the University of Tennessee.  I hadn’t planned to stay, but I fell in love with the mountains. Recently I retired after a fruitful 44-year career here. Concern for this land and for my children and grandchildren led me to environmental activism and shifted my teaching and writing from mathematical logic to environmental and intergenerational ethics. Eventually I wrote or edited four books on environmental matters (two specifically on the southern Appalachian environment) in addition to three on logic and (most recently) a tome on the tricky topic of incomparable values.

John's book list on loss and hope in the southern Appalachian environment

Discover why each book is one of John's favorite books.

Why did John love this book?

Camuto’s supple prose draws the reader into a journey toward mountains that no longer exist, although they are named on some old maps: the southern Appalachians not as they are, but as they were before the European invasion. A keen historian and observant naturalist, Camuto walks deep into “what’s left of the backcountry,” documenting the hopeful reintroduction of the nearly extinct red wolf and reflecting on Cherokee place names, culture, and history. "Needless to say,” he confesses, “I never got to the Cherokee Mountains”—and, in sad irony, shortly after the book’s publication the red wolf reintroduction failed. Still, Camuto has succeeded in recording resonant reminiscences of places, peoples, and biotic populations now lost.

By Christopher Camuto,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Another Country as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The southern Appalachians encompass one of the most beautiful, biologically diverse, and historically important regions of North America. In the widely acclaimed Another Country: Journeying toward the Cherokee Mountains, Christopher Camuto describes the tragic collision of natural and cultural history embedded in the region. In the spirit of Thoreau's "Walking," Camuto explores the Appalachian summit country of the Great Smoky Mountains-the historical home of the Cherokee-searching for access to the nature, history, and spirit of a magnificent, if diminished, landscape.

As the author takes the reader through old-growth forests and ancient myths, he tells of the attempted restoration of Canis…


To Live Here, You Have to Fight

By Jessica Wilkerson,

Book cover of To Live Here, You Have to Fight: How Women Led Appalachian Movements for Social Justice

Melissa Estes Blair Author Of Revolutionizing Expectations: Women's Organizations, Feminism, and American Politics, 1965-1980

From the list on U.S. grassroots feminism.

Who am I?

I have loved history since I was a girl, visiting my grandparents in Virginia and reading American Girl books. I began to focus on women’s history when I learned in college just how much the women’s movement of the generation before mine had made my life possible. So much changed for American women in the ten years before I was born, and I wanted to know how that happened and how it fit into the broader political changes. That connection, between women making change and the bigger political scene, remains the core of my research. I have a B.A. in history and English from the University of Kentucky, and a Ph.D. in American history from the University of Virginia.

Melissa's book list on U.S. grassroots feminism

Discover why each book is one of Melissa's favorite books.

Why did Melissa love this book?

Wilkerson finds feminists everywhere in the mountains of eastern Kentucky, which makes this the most geographically unexpected book on this list. By showing how women were central to many social justice movements – not only feminism but environmental justice, health care, and welfare rights – Wilkerson shows us how women truly did lead in the 1970s, in parts of the country where stereotypes suggest they shouldn’t be active at all.

By Jessica Wilkerson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked To Live Here, You Have to Fight as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Launched in 1964, the War on Poverty quickly took aim at the coalfields of southern Appalachia. There, the federal government found unexpected allies among working-class white women devoted to a local tradition of citizen caregiving and seasoned by decades of activism and community service.

Jessica Wilkerson tells their stories within the larger drama of efforts to enact change in the 1960s and 1970s. She shows white Appalachian women acting as leaders and soldiers in a grassroots war on poverty--shaping and sustaining programs, engaging in ideological debates, offering fresh visions of democratic participation, and facing personal political struggles. Their insistence that…


A Year Without Months

By Charles Dodd White,

Book cover of A Year Without Months

Jane Harrington Author Of In Circling Flight

From the list on transporting readers to the Appalachian Mountains.

Who am I?

I live in the southern Appalachians, a place that boasts some of the most beautiful views on earth and laments some of the most ravaged landscapes. As a fiction writer who is passionate about nature and human rights, I’ve taken up my pen to craft a novel with regular people at its heart, all living regular lives that are disrupted by tragedies all too common to the region. This is the general throughline in the books I am recommending, although the themes differ. I’ve offered a variety of genres, as well, which best reflects my own bookshelf at my home in the hills. 

Jane's book list on transporting readers to the Appalachian Mountains

Discover why each book is one of Jane's favorite books.

Why did Jane love this book?

This is not a work of fiction but a memoir by a novelist, an unflinching portrait of generations of a family ever at the brink. It reads almost as vignettes, exquisitely crafted and somehow soothing even in their brutal honesty. Poignantly rendered pieces of the author’s life reflect aspects of Appalachian culture that can often come across as stereotyping, but the personal nature of this work combined with Dodd White’s skilled pen makes it an authentic view into struggles endemic to the region. He bravely writes of suicides in his family, most heartbreakingly that of his son. Until I read this book, Joan Didion’s A Year of Magical Thinking was secure in its position at the top of my “best memoirs” list.

By Charles Dodd White,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Year Without Months as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This collection of fourteen essays by Charles Dodd White-praised by Silas House as "one of the best prose stylists of Appalachian literature"-explores the boundaries of family, loss, masculinity, and place. Contemplating the suicides of his father, uncle, and son, White meditates on what it means to go on when seemingly everything worth living for is lost. What he discovers is an intimate connection to the natural world, a renewed impulse to understand his troubled family history, and a devotion to following the clues that point to the possibility of a whole life.

Avoiding easy sentiment and cliche, White's transformative language…


Tears of Grief Hollow

By Shawn Burgess,

Book cover of Tears of Grief Hollow

David Allen Voyles Author Of Tales from the Hearse: Thirteen Tales of Spine-Tingling Terror

From the list on horror you’ve probably never heard of but should.

Who am I?

I have loved Halloween horror my whole life. As a teacher of literature, I always looked forward to October when I had a green light to incorporate the greatest horror authors into my lessons. The desire to share new horror stories did not fade when I retired. There are so many wonderful new authors of horror it’s impossible to read them all! But there’s also a lot of trash out there—I know, I’ve read it! My lifelong love of spooky things and my background in literature make me confident that I won’t be steering readers wrong when they look to me for the best new reads in horror.

David's book list on horror you’ve probably never heard of but should

Discover why each book is one of David's favorite books.

Why did David love this book?

I think author Shawn Burgess loves Halloween as much as I do, and it shows in his writing. We connected, as many writers do, through social media before I had read his debut novel. I was thrilled to find that I did not have to offer only polite compliments after reading it; I genuinely loved it! The story involves a group of boys who are drawn into the mystery surrounding the death of an autistic girl in their small Appalachian community. The feel of the group is reminiscent of the pre-teen characters in Stephen King’s short story, “The Body” (later made into the Rob Reiner’s movie Stand By Me) but unlike King’s story, this one definitely has otherworldly elements. Note: The title of this novel has just recently changed from The Tear Collector as Burgess has expanded the storyline into a series. I’ll definitely keep reading.

By Shawn Burgess,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Tears of Grief Hollow as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The misdeeds of our ancestors are debts passed from generation to generation. They lurk, hidden in the shadows, waiting for the right time to be collected. For the residents of Harper Pass—their debt is due.

When a young autistic girl goes missing from a small Appalachian community, the residents of Harper Pass descend into chaos. Brooks Raker and his friends stumble across the police investigation, and as they dig deeper into the mysterious events, the boys realize the fate of their missing classmate pales in comparison with the evil lurking in the shadows of the quiet little town.

With four…


Outer Dark

By Cormac McCarthy,

Book cover of Outer Dark

Hugh Sheehy Author Of Design Flaw

From the list on the world as a dream.

Who am I?

I’ve loved fiction that excites my mind and imagination since I was very young. I spent a lot of time in the library growing up, mostly reading horror and historical narratives. Later, I became interested in music, painting, film, philosophy, psychology, cognitive science, religion, and politics. I’m not an expert in anything—I’m too driven to make things to be a good scholar—but these are the subject areas that inform what I write.

Hugh's book list on the world as a dream

Discover why each book is one of Hugh's favorite books.

Why did Hugh love this book?

McCarthy’s second novel is an underappreciated masterpiece, one that combines the author’s distinct style and notoriously difficult subject matter with a genuinely sublime vision of the world. Simultaneously a horror novel, a historical fiction, a Gnostic heresy, a cosmic joke, and act of spiritual seeking, I cannot recommend it enough.  

By Cormac McCarthy,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Outer Dark as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

By Cormac McCarthy, the author of the critically acclaimed Border Trilogy, Outer Dark is a novel at once mythic and starkly evocative, set in an unspecified place in Appalachia sometime around the turn of the century. A woman bears her brother's child, a boy; the brother leaves the baby in the woods and tells her he died of natural causes. Discovering her brother's lie, she sets forth alone to find her son. Both brother and sister wander separately through a countryside being scourged by three terrifying and elusive strangers, headlong toward an eerie, apocalyptic resolution.


Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

By Lily Hopp Kingsolver, Barbara Kingsolver, Camille Kingsolver, Steven L Hopp

Book cover of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life

Heidi Matonis Author Of Hatching Love

From the list on optimists and animal lovers.

Who am I?

I am an optimist. I jump out of bed in the morning ready to read and write. With my dog and cat by my side and a cup of coffee in hand, I lose myself in whatever I am working on. I am deeply curious about a gamut of subjects and constantly challenge myself to learn more. I am persistent and not afraid of hard work. Nature and animals are my bottomless well of inspiration and joy. I very much believe life is a journey and I try to enjoy each step.

Heidi's book list on optimists and animal lovers

Discover why each book is one of Heidi's favorite books.

Why did Heidi love this book?

This book was crucial in my path to veganism.

It is a memoir where Barbara Kingsolver writes humorously about a year of living off the land. She is not a vegetarian but must raise, kill, and butcher animals if she wants to eat meat. The result is, every time she eats meat, she weighs the emotional cost.

This reckoning has been my bible. I ask myself, would I be willing to kill the chick I raised to eat? Inevitably, the answer is “no.” 

The book is not a treaty encouraging people to live off the land, it’s the opposite. It makes you appreciate every bit of food you put in your mouth and the fact you did not have to grow, harvest, clean and cook it. 

By Lily Hopp Kingsolver, Barbara Kingsolver, Camille Kingsolver, Steven L Hopp

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Animal, Vegetable, Miracle as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"We wanted to live in a place that could feed us: where rain falls, crops grow, and drinking water bubbles up right out of the ground."

Barbara Kingsolver opens her home to us, as she and her family attempt a year of eating only local food, much of it from their own garden. Inspired by the flavours and culinary arts of a local food culture, they explore many a farmers market and diversified organic farms at home and across the country. With characteristic warmth, Kingsolver shows us how to put food back at the centre of the political and family…


Old Nathan

By David Drake,

Book cover of Old Nathan

D.J. Butler Author Of The Cunning Man

From the list on fantasy full of real-world magic.

Who am I?

I love fantasy literature, because it's the what-if literature of the human spirit. Magic animates fantasy, and in the real world, magic is difficult to define; it lies somewhere on the border of the unconscious mind, the lore of our grandparents, scientific hypothesis, what the priest tells us, and what we see in social groups other than our own. In recent decades, much fantasy literature has walked away from portrayals of real-world magic, replacing it with synthetic and sterile creations euphemistically called “hard magic.” Hard magic has the form of magic, but lacks the power thereof. These books are all strong inoculations against the scourge of hard magic.

D.J.'s book list on fantasy full of real-world magic

Discover why each book is one of D.J.'s favorite books.

Why did D.J. love this book?

Drake’s old Nathan is explicitly identified as a “cunning man” throughout these tales. Inspired by Wellman’s Silver John, Old Nathan is a predecessor, an Appalachian wizard in the late 1700s and early 1800s, using real-world folk magic to ward off curses, heal wounds, and otherwise battle evil. Like Silver John and Hiram Woolley, Old Nathan is a war veteran—a veteran of the Revolutionary War. Nathan’s war wounds left him crippled and pulled aside from ordinary life, turning him into the course of becoming a magician.

By David Drake,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Old Nathan as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

FIFTH YEARS AFTER
THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION,
MAGIC IS LOOSE IN THE BACKWOODS

The forces of evil are poised to prey on the folk of the hamlets and hollows: witches, demons, and red-handed men—but first they'll have to overcome Old Nathan the Wizard.

He doesn't claim much for his magical powers, but they're real enough for what they are—and besides, he hasn't forgotten how to use his long flintlock rifle ....

Enter the gritty, realistic world of Old Nathan, a backwoodsman who talks to animals and says he'll face The Devil himself-and who in the end will have to face The…


Prodigal Summer

By Barbara Kingsolver,

Book cover of Prodigal Summer

John Nolt Author Of A Land Imperiled: The Declining Health of the Southern Appalachian Bioregion

From the list on loss and hope in the southern Appalachian environment.

Who am I?

I moved from Ohio to southern Appalachia in 1978 to take a temporary job teaching philosophy at the University of Tennessee.  I hadn’t planned to stay, but I fell in love with the mountains. Recently I retired after a fruitful 44-year career here. Concern for this land and for my children and grandchildren led me to environmental activism and shifted my teaching and writing from mathematical logic to environmental and intergenerational ethics. Eventually I wrote or edited four books on environmental matters (two specifically on the southern Appalachian environment) in addition to three on logic and (most recently) a tome on the tricky topic of incomparable values.

John's book list on loss and hope in the southern Appalachian environment

Discover why each book is one of John's favorite books.

Why did John love this book?

It is an erotic romance of many species. This lush, exuberant novel interweaves the stories of three strong twentieth-century women whose lives are shaped both by their lusts and by the sights, sounds, tastes, scents, and textures of the southern Appalachian landscape. The women’s lives mingle in turn with the lives of others similarly influenced by their lusts and by different sensations of that landscape—among them moths, mice, birds, and immigrant coyotes. The shifts of perspective among Kingsolver’s vividly and voluptuously imagined human and nonhuman protagonists are both disorienting and fascinating. Of this work Kingsolver later writes, “Reader, hear my confession: I have written an unchaste novel.”

By Barbara Kingsolver,

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked Prodigal Summer as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

It is summer in the Appalachian mountains and love, desire and attraction are in the air. Nature, too, it seems, is not immune. From her outpost in an isolated mountain cabin, Deanna Wolfe, a reclusive wildlife biologist, watches a den of coyotes that have recently migrated into the region. She is caught off guard by a young hunter who invades her most private spaces and interrupts her self-assured, solitary life. On a farm several miles down the mountain, Lusa Maluf Landowski, a bookish city girl turned farmer's wife, finds herself marooned in a strange place where she must declare or…


Ramp Hollow

By Steven Stoll,

Book cover of Ramp Hollow: The Ordeal of Appalachia

Chris Smaje Author Of Saying NO to a Farm-Free Future: The Case For an Ecological Food System and Against Manufactured Foods

From the list on why we must adopt low-impact local food systems.

Who am I?

I started my career as an academic social scientist and seem set to end it as a gardener, small-scale farmer, and accidental ecological activist. I’ve learned a lot of things along the way from these different parts of my life that I channel in my writing. I don’t claim much expertise. In fact, I think claims to expert knowledge that can ‘solve’ modern problems are a big part of our modern problems. I’ve always been interested in how people and communities try to figure things out for themselves, often by picking up the pieces when big ideas have failed them. My writing arises out of that.

Chris' book list on why we must adopt low-impact local food systems

Discover why each book is one of Chris' favorite books.

Why did Chris love this book?

Almost everywhere, there’s a local agrarian tradition in which people ingeniously figured out how to build autonomous livelihoods on their local ecological base. And almost everywhere it’s been destroyed by modern economic forces, which not only import energy and capital non-resiliently from elsewhere, but also import scorn for older rural ways once admired for their tenacity.

With a historian’s eye for detail, a storyteller’s gift for narrative, and an intensely human empathy for ordinary lives, Steven Stoll tells this story in the case of Appalachia in the United States. But the implications go much wider, and are endlessly informative for thinking through the basis of local agrarian societies worldwide today.     

By Steven Stoll,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Ramp Hollow as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Short-listed for the Phi Beta Kappa Ralph Waldo Emerson Book Award

In Ramp Hollow, Steven Stoll offers a fresh, provocative account of Appalachia, and why it matters. He begins with the earliest European settlers, whose desire for vast forests to hunt in was frustrated by absentee owners―including George Washington and other founders―who laid claim to the region. Even as Daniel Boone became famous as a backwoods hunter and guide, the economy he represented was already in peril. Within just a few decades, Appalachian hunters and farmers went from pioneers to pariahs, from heroes to hillbillies, in the national imagination, and…


Bloodroot

By Amy Greene,

Book cover of Bloodroot

John Mantooth Author Of Holy Ghost Road

From the list on appealing to horror readers and non-horror readers.

Who am I?

I don’t consider myself specifically a horror reader (or writer for that matter!) any more than I consider myself a fantasy, mystery, or science fiction reader. As a writer (under my real name John Mantooth as well as my pseudonym, Hank Early), much of my work has been classified as horror, though I take pride in my novels appealing to people who aren’t typically well-versed in the genre. So, it got me thinking… what are some novels that may or may not be classified as horror that will appeal to a wide range of readers? I call these books horror-adjacent, and no matter what you typically read, I think you’ll enjoy them. 

John's book list on appealing to horror readers and non-horror readers

Discover why each book is one of John's favorite books.

Why did John love this book?

Another one I read many years ago that still has its claws in me today. A sprawling epic made up of many Appalachian voices. There’s magic and grief and family secrets. It’s a Southern Gothic that will grip you from the first page and has influenced me as a writer in a myriad of ways. This might be an example of a novel that wasn’t classified as horror, but very well could have been. Will appeal to all kinds of readers. 

By Amy Greene,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Bloodroot as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

A dark and riveting story of the legacies—of magic and madness, faith and secrets, passion and loss—that haunt one family across the generations.

Myra Lamb is a wild girl with mysterious, haint blue eyes who grows up on remote Bloodroot Mountain. Her grandmother, Byrdie, protects her fiercely and passes down “the touch” that bewitches people and animals alike. But when John Odom tries to tame Myra, it sparks a shocking disaster, ripping lives apart.

"A fascinating look at a rural world full of love and life, and dreams and disappointment." --The Boston Globe

"If Wuthering Heights had been…


Book cover of Night Comes to the Cumberlands: A Biography of a Depressed Area

Matthew Algeo Author Of All This Marvelous Potential: Robert Kennedy's 1968 Tour of Appalachia

From the list on Appalachia (for people who aren’t from Appalachia).

Who am I?

I was born and raised in the suburbs of eastern Pennsylvania, not far from the Appalachian Mountains, but a world away from the place the rest of the country calls “Appalachia.” Researching All This Marvelous Potential, my book about Robert Kennedy’s 1968 tour of eastern Kentucky, was a revelation. Appalachia is rich in Black history, and queer history, and labor history, and a national leader in education. I am a journalist and author. All This Marvelous Potential is my sixth book.

Matthew's book list on Appalachia (for people who aren’t from Appalachia)

Discover why each book is one of Matthew's favorite books.

Why did Matthew love this book?

Few books have changed the course of history like Harry Caudill’s Night Comes to the Cumberlands. Exposing political corruption, environmental destruction, and endemic poverty in Appalachia, Night Comes put poverty squarely on the national agenda and inspired LBJ’s War on Poverty. Although not rigorously factual — Caudill never let the facts get in the way of a good story — Night Comes is a priceless document of its time and place, and required reading for anyone who wants to understand Appalachian culture and history in the middle of the 20th century.

By Harry M. Caudill,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Night Comes to the Cumberlands as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

At the start of the 1960s the USA was unquestionably the wealthiest and most powerful nation in the world.

Yet despite its prosperity and influence there were areas of the country which seemed to have been forgotten.

In 1962 Harry Caudill, a lawyer and legislator, decided to shine a light upon the appalling conditions which he witnessed in Eastern Kentucky.

His introduction lays out the issues which he saw before him: A million Americans in the Southern Appalachians live in conditions of squalor, ignorance and ill health which could scarcely be equaled in Europe or Japan or, perhaps, in parts…


Cattywampus

By Ash Van Otterloo,

Book cover of Cattywampus

Karah Sutton Author Of A Wolf for a Spell

From the list on witches as heroes.

Who am I?

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I feel like a bunch of different personalities all wrapped up in a trenchcoat. Which one is the dominant me? Maybe funny and cheerful, maybe quiet and reclusive, maybe ambitious or adventurous – or maybe I’m all of these things? I think I’m drawn to witches because they're so surprising: a witch might be helpful, or she might try to eat you. It’s that unpredictability and mystery which intimidates people, so a witch is considered scary – until she’s not – and when I open a book about a witch, I never know what to expect!

Karah's book list on witches as heroes

Discover why each book is one of Karah's favorite books.

Why did Karah love this book?

This is a hilarious romp following daughters of rival witch families Katy and Delpha as they come to terms with their magic, their families, and each other. As a Kentuckian, I loved seeing Appalachia depicted in such loving, real detail. And yes, there are some outrageous zombie grannies too. This story was such a breath of fresh mountain air.

By Ash Van Otterloo,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Cattywampus as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The magical story of a hex that goes haywire, and the power of friendship to set things right!

In the town of Howler's Hollow, conjuring magic is strictly off-limits. Only nothing makes Delpha McGill's skin crawl more than rules. So when she finds her family's secret book of hexes, she's itching to use it to banish her mama's money troubles. She just has to keep it quieter than a church mouse -- not exactly Delpha's specialty.

Trouble is, Katybird Hearn is hankering to get her hands on the spell book, too. The daughter of a rival witching family, Katy has…


Walking Toward the Sunset

By Wayne Winkler,

Book cover of Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia

Lisa Alther Author Of Washed in the Blood

From the list on Melungeons and their history.

Who am I?

I first heard about Melungeons when a babysitter told me they would “git” me if I didn’t behave.  She said they lived in caves outside our East Tennessee town and had six fingers on each hand.  I consigned these creatures to myth and nightmares, until a cousin informed me that some of our shared ancestors were Melungeons and showed me scars from the removal of his extra thumbs.  For the next ten years I visited sites related to Melungeons and interviewed many who claimed Melungeon ancestry, running DNA tests on some. This research yielded my memoir Kinfolks: Falling Off The Family Tree and my historical novel Washed In The Blood.

Lisa's book list on Melungeons and their history

Discover why each book is one of Lisa's favorite books.

Why did Lisa love this book?

This is the most thorough compendium yet of the available information about Melungeons.  Winkler covers the little that is known about Melungeon history, as well as exploring the many origin myths and theories – of descent from shipwrecked Potuguese sailors, from deserters from DeSoto’s exploring expedition, from survivors of Juan Pardo’s torched wilderness forts, etc.  He also describes associated mixed race groups and relates some of the scientific efforts to pin down the genesis of the Melungeons.

By Wayne Winkler,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Walking Toward the Sunset as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Walking toward the Sunset is a historical examination of the Melungeons, a mixed-race group predominantly in southern Appalachia. Author Wayne Winkler reviews theories about the Melungeons, compares the Melungeons with other mixed-race groups, and incorporates the latest scientific research to present a comprehensive portrait. In his telling portrait, Winkler examines the history of the Melungeons and the ongoing controversy surrounding their mysterious origins. Employing historical records, news reports over almost two centuries, and personal interviews, Winkler tells the fascinating story of a people who did not fit the rigid racial categories of American society. Along the way, Winkler recounts the…


All the Forgivenesses

By Elizabeth Hardinger,

Book cover of All the Forgivenesses

JuliAnne Sisung Author Of Curse of the Damselfly

From the list on unconventional, courageous women.

Who am I?

When I was a child, my mother and I shared and discussed Zane Grey books. I loved his portrayal of the past and read every one. My obsession with historical fiction grew, and I wrote my first draft of Elephant in the Room at age sixteen. I’m stuck in the period between 1875 and 1940 because of the simplicity driving life as well as the complexity of larger events changing the world. Wilder, Steinbeck, Twain, all picked me off my feet and set me down in their shoes. I’m not able to remove them. I write about courageous women because we are, whether it’s expressed or is in waiting.  

JuliAnne's book list on unconventional, courageous women

Discover why each book is one of JuliAnne's favorite books.

Why did JuliAnne love this book?

Set in Kentucky hill country at the birth of the twentieth century, a farm family scrabbles for sustenance with little help from an undependable father with an attachment to whiskey. Bertie is fifteen when her mother dies, and she is forced to raise her four younger siblings, but she was accustomed to doing the chores during the long years of her mother’s illness. She handles the work but fears she lacks the wisdom and warmth a mother should provide. She struggles to understand her sharp-tongued younger sister, Dacia, and her own responsibility for the early death of Timmy.  

The tale is written in old hill country dialect and paints a captivating portrait of a woman’s strength, determination, and pragmatism. I was entranced by Bertie’s harsh but loving family.

By Elizabeth Hardinger,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked All the Forgivenesses as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Set in Appalachia and the Midwest at the turn of the twentieth century, this exquisite debut novel paints an intimate portrait of one resilient farm family’s challenges and hard-won triumphs—helmed by an unforgettable heroine.
 
Growing up on their hardscrabble farm in rural Kentucky, fifteen-year-old Albertina “Bertie” Winslow has learned a lot from her mama, Polly. She knows how to lance a boil, make a pie crust, butcher a pig, and tend to every chore that needs doing. What she doesn’t know, but is forced to reckon with all too soon, is how to look after children as a mother should…