The raindrop waltz, and other plays

Carden, Gary

Trillium Books

Stories I Lived to Tell: An Appalachian Memoir

Biographies & Memoirs

Community & Culture

The University of North Carolina Press

In a unique Appalachian Christmas story that includes music and lyrics, a thirteen-year-old girl recounts the efforts of her, her siblings, and her wise grandmother to bring the joy of Christmas to her father after her mother's death. Tour. IP.

Papa's Angels: A Christmas Story

Paxton, Collin Wilcox

Children's Books

New World Library

The Southern Appalachian Mountains have forever been a region of mystery, wonder and legend. And in their isolation, it was only natural that the people who inhabited this rugged and beautiful land would treasure story telling. Collected here are stories that mountain people have told and retold for generations - stories of ghosts and belled buzzards that foretell death; stories of murders and hangings, of strange happenings and humorous events; stories, too, of some of the remarkable people these mountains have produced. Most of these stories are true; some are legendary - but all are enthralling. --- from book's back cover

Belled Buzzards, Hucksters & Grieving Spectres: Strange & True Tales of the Appalachian Mountains

Politics & Social Sciences

Anderson, Nina

Social Sciences

Down Home Pr

In 1940, when Gary Carden was six years old, a flash flood Struck the isolated mountain cove where he lived. Watching the flood rage through his grandparents' front yard, Gary got an idea. He hauled his Grandmother's canning jars out on the porch and proceeded to write notes which he stuffed in the jars. "Hello," the notes said, "Come and play with me!" He gave his name and address, signed each note, screwed the lids on and threw the Mason jars into the rushing stream. He watched them rush away amid the hog pens, outhouses and dead chickens, confident that he would find a playmate. He watched the little dirt trail into the cove for weeks, hoping that someone would arrive with one of those jars-someone to talk to. 
Now, sixty years later, Gary has written a book that uses the '40s flood as an analogy. "My short stories are like those Mason jars," he says. "I'm still sending out messages out of this cove, hoping to communicate." Gary's cove has changed. There is now a paved road with a center line and lots of traffic. Now, Gary spends each summer telling stories at festivals, eldershostels and civic clubs. He talks about summer nights on the front porch listening to his Granny talk as she strings beans...vivid stories about drowned babies, mountain "painters," and Gary's father, "Happy," the mountain musician who was murdered when Gary was two years old. There are tales about eccentric uncles, Saturday westerns, Lash La Rue, Thomas Wolfe and Gary's imaginary playmate, Audie Murphy; there are bizarre neighbors, childhood sweethearts, unsolved murders, and much, much more.

Mason Jars in the Flood and Other Stories

Literature & Fiction

United States

Parkway Pub

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Books by Carden, Gary