Southern Gothic

Playing Books & Bites Bingo? Try these suggestions for the prompt, a Southern Gothic.

According to Book Riot, southern gothic literature "usually features eccentric, flawed characters, sinister events, elements of the supernatural or fantastical, and themes relating to race, class, decay, violence, and isolation."

Updated July 19, 2024
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Bastard out of Carolina
Allison, Dorothy.
Ebook
A profound portrait of family dynamics in the rural South and "an essential novel" (The New Yorker) "As close to flawless as any reader could ask for . . . The living language [Allison] has created is as exact and innovative as the language of To Kill a...
Midnight in the garden of good and evil : a Savannah story
Berendt, John
Paper Book
THE LANDMARK NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER, NOW A MAJOR MUSICAL COMING SOON TO BROADWAY * An enormously engaging portrait of a most beguiling Southern city: "Elegant and wicked.... [This] might be the first true-crime book that makes the reader want to book a bed and breakfast...
House of cotton
Brashears, Monica
Paper Book
FINALIST for the 2024 NYPL Young Lions Fiction Award * NPR BEST BOOK OF 2023 * An enchanting Black Southern gothic debut, perfect for readers of Mexican Gothic... "Fresh, haunting...In her roller-coaster ride of a gothic debut novel, Monica Brashears upends expectations at...
Ring shout : or, Hunting Ku Kluxes in the end times
Clark, P. Djèlí
Paper Book
Nebula, Locus, and Alex Award-winner P. Djèlí Clark returns with Ring Shout, a dark fantasy historical novella that gives a supernatural twist to the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror "A fantastical, brutal and thrilling triumph of the imagination...Clark's combination of...
The boatman's daughter
Davidson, Andy
Paper Book
"Go read Andy Davidson's lush nightmare, The Boatman's Daughter. It put an arrow through my head and heart." --Paul Tremblay, author of Growing Things "Ample bloodshed is offset by beautiful prose . . . A stunning supernatural Southern Gothic." --...
As I Lay Dying
Faulkner, William
Paper Book
Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time From the Modern Library's new set of beautifully repackaged hardcover classics by William Faulkner--also available are Snopes, The Sound and the Fury, Light in August, Absalom, Absalom!, and Selected...
Crooked letter, crooked letter
Franklin, Tom.
Paper Book
"The classic trifecta of talent, heart, and a bone-deep sense of storytelling....A masterful performance, deftly rendered and deeply satisfying. For days on end, I woke with this story on my mind."    -- David Wroblewski   "A new Tom Franklin...
The keepers of the house
Grau, Shirley Ann.
Ebook
A "beautifully written" Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about prejudice and a distinguished family's secrets in the American South (The Atlantic Monthly). Seven generations of the Howland family have lived in the Alabama plantation home built by an ancestor who fought...
Starling house
Harrow, Alix E.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK "This book has everything you could possibly want this fall...a cursed town, a haunted house, a vivid & eerie setting--plus, characters willing to risk everything." --Reese Witherspoon (Reese's Book Club October '23 Pick)...
Wake the Bones A Novel
Kilcoyne, Elizabeth.
Paper Book
"YA horror has found a new standard-bearer." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "Dark, gripping, and gorgeous, Wake the Bones will lead you into the woods and keep you up late. As lush and sweltering as a Kentucky summer... Elizabeth Kilcoyne is a force." -...
The cutting season : a novel
Locke, Attica.
Paper Book
From Attica Locke, a writer and producer of FOX's Empire: "The Cutting Season is a rare murder mystery with heft, a historical novel that thrills, a page-turner that makes you think. Attica Locke is a dazzling writer with a conscience."--Dolen Perkins-Valdez, New York Times ...
When the reckoning comes : a novel
McQueen, LaTanya
Paper Book
"LaTanya McQueen's When The Reckoning Comes is so deliciously uncomfortable there were moments where I had to put the book down, take a deep breath, and like Mira, its protagonist, urge myself to go further. This is a novel, like Octavia Butler's Kindred, that reminds its...
Beloved
Morrison, Toni
Paper Book
PULITZER PRIZE WINNER * NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A spellbinding novel that transforms history into a story as powerful as Exodus and as intimate as a lullaby. With a new afterword by the author.  This "brutally powerful, mesmerizing story" (...
Wise blood
O'Connor, Flannery.
Ebook
The American short story master Flannery O'Connor's haunting first novel of faith, false prophets, and redemptive wisdom. Wise Blood, Flannery O'Connor's astonishing and haunting first novel, is a classic of twentieth-century literature. It is the story of Hazel Motes, a...
The toll
Priest, Cherie
Paper Book
A 2020 LOCUS AWARD FINALIST FOR BEST HORROR NOVEL From Cherie Priest, the author of The Family Plot and Maplecroft, comes The Toll, a tense, dark, and scary treat for modern fans of the traditionally strange and macabre. ...
Sorrowland
Solomon, Rivers
Paper Book
A TIME 100 Must-Read Book of 2021 A New York Times Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Book of 2021 The Stonewall Book Award winner of 2022 Named a Best Book of 2021 by NPR, The New York Public Library, Publishers Weekly<...
The little friend
Tartt, Donna.
Paper Book
The hugely anticipated new novel by the author ofThe Secret History—a best-seller nationwide and around the world, and one of the most astonishing debuts in recent times—The Little Friendis even more transfixing and resonant. In a small Mississippi town, Harriet Cleve Dusfresnes grows...
The color purple
Walker, Alice
Paper Book
Read the original inspiration for the new, boldly reimagined film from producers Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg, starring Taraji P. Henson, Danielle Brooks, and Fantasia Barrino. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, now in a beautiful Penguin Vitae edition...
Sing, unburied, sing : a novel
Ward, Jesmyn
Paper Book
*WINNER of the NATIONAL BOOK AWARD for FICTION *A TIME MAGAZINE BEST NOVEL OF THE YEAR and A NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 OF 2017 *Finalist for the Kirkus Prize *Finalist for the Andrew Carnegie Medal *Finalist for the Aspen Words Literary Prize...
A streetcar named Desire
Williams, Tennessee
Paper Book
It is a very short list of 20th-century American plays that continue to have the same power and impact as when they first appeared--57 years after its Broadway premiere, Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire is one of those plays. The story famously recounts how the faded and promiscuous...
Holy city : a novel
Wise, Henry
Paper Book
"Holy City is an amazing piece of work. A Southern novel that examines the pathos and ethos of small-town life and the weight of both grief and hatred. Love it."--S.A. Cosby No one innocent. No one free. Nothing sacred. Holy City is the...
Winter's bone : a novel
Woodrell, Daniel.
Paper Book
Daniel Woodrell's modern classic is an unforgettable tale of desperation and courage that inspired the award-winning film starring Jennifer Lawrence.  Ree Dolly's father has skipped bail on charges that he ran a crystal meth lab, and the Dollys will lose...

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