Storied Charlotte

Patricia Joslin’s New Poetry Collection

April 26, 2026 by Mark West

Before I write a Storied Charlotte blog post, I often exchange numerous email messages with the person whose work I am featuring in that particular blog post, and that is certainly the case with this blog post about Patricia Joslin and her new poetry collection titled No Packing Necessary: Poems for the Solo Journey. Patricia emailed me about a month ago and informed me that her forthcoming poetry collection would soon be published by Main Street Rag. I responded by saying that I would write blog post about her new poetry collection closer to the book’s official release. Since I knew that she planned to launch the book in early May, I emailed her last week and asked her if she could send me a write up about her new poetry collection that I could include in this week’s blog post. Her response surprised me. She wrote, “I am in Morocco at the tail end of a vacation, but I will be home on Sunday.” She said that she would send me something as soon as she returned to Charlotte. I told her that I do not get many emails from Morocco. I agreed to wait until I heard from her before writing this week’s post. Sure enough, on Sunday night she sent me a write up about how her new collection came to be. Here is what she sent to me:

I grew up in southern Wisconsin and raised my family in Minnesota. My husband and I, both weary of the endless cold and gray skies, dreamt of a change for our retirement years. Our daughter attended Davidson College for her undergraduate program. We visited often, and decided the weather here was more appealing than what we lived with in the Midwest.

In the fall of 2002, as our son started his freshman year at the University of Michigan, we took the leap and settled in Charlotte, embarking on a new chapter. I often joke that I spent my first fifty years up North and plan to spend my last fifty basking in the Southern warmth.

But life, as it often does, shifted unexpectedly. In 2018, after forty-one years of marriage, my husband died of pancreatic cancer. Managing loss is an intensely personal experience. Writing has always been my refuge, and in the aftermath of loss, I sought creative ways to process my grief. At the time, the Levine Cancer Institute offered writing workshops for cancer patients and their caregivers. Meeting weekly with others familiar with cancer who wanted to write about their experiences (with the guidance of a therapist) was a great start for me.

In early 2019 I discovered Charlotte Center for the Literary Arts (Charlotte Lit). I began attending weekly open-studio Pen to Paper classes. There, I explored writing personal essays, flirted with the idea of a memoir, and finally—unexpectedly—fell in love with poetry. A class with Dannye Romine Powell opened the door to a whole new way of expressing myself. Dannye’s teaching was transformative, and in 2021, I joined a cohort of eleven poets as part of the inaugural Chapbook Lab, a year-long workshop program at Charlotte Lit. The experience was intense, challenging, and deeply rewarding. Each poet was paired with a mentor; I was fortunate to work with the acclaimed Lola Haskins. Our shared goal was to create a book of poetry by the end of the year—a task that required both vulnerability and discipline.

In 2023, my first book, I’ll Buy Flowers Again Tomorrow: Poems of Loss and Healing, was published by Charlotte Lit Press. The poems echo the grief of the cancer journey so many face today. Yet they offer the promise of hope and healing to those who remain behind. I’ve received heartfelt messages from recent widows who found in my poetry a way to understand their own grief.

My second book was just published by Main Street Rag. No Packing Necessary: Poems for the Solo Journey is a collection of narrative poetry meant for those recovering from loss. The title, drawn from a line in one of the poems, speaks to the timelessness of what we carry in our hearts—memories, love, longing. These poems explore widowhood, aging, and the quiet magic of life in later years, inviting readers to find their own path forward. It has now been eight years since my husband’s death, yet grief remains a companion, sometimes surfacing unexpectedly. Not long ago, I watched Casablanca and found myself sobbing for lost love. The final poem in my book, “Sunday Morning in the City of Love” references the famous line…” We’ll always have Paris.” Of course I cried.

In 2024 I moved to The Village on Morehead, a retirement community close to Uptown.

The Village is a phenomenal place to live, filled with vibrant people and a motto that encourages us to “Live Life Boldly.” Please join us on May 5th from 4 to 5:30 pm as we celebrate Cinco de Mayo and the launch of my new book at The Village. To learn more about the event, order your copy, or read some of my poetry, visit my website: patriciajoslin.com.

I congratulate Patricia on the publication of this new poetry collection. To give readers a sense of this book, I offer this blurb by David E. Poston. “‘The divine exists even in the darkest places,’ writes Joslin, but these poems are far from dark. Though many deal with aging, mortality, and grief, they exhibit grace, vulnerability, and empathy. She renders the world in vivid sensory detail—a flash of cardinal’s wing, rock wrens rising in song, the scent of her father’s pipe tobacco—and moves us to see the ‘bliss in the mystery of it.’” I am pleased that Patricia has been able to find a bit of the divine right here in Storied Charlotte.

Tags: Patricia Joslin poetry collection

Rebecca McClanahan’s New Memoir

April 18, 2026 by Mark West

On December 21, 2020, I wrote a Storied Charlotte blog post about Rebecca McClanahan’s then recently published memoir titled In the Key of New York City: A Memoir in Essays. As I noted in my blog post at the time, In the Key of New York City was Rebecca’s eleventh book, and it was about the eleven years that she and her husband lived in New York City. After returning to Charlotte, Rebecca found herself focusing much of her time and energy on taking care of her elderly parents. Now that her parents have died, Rebecca has drawn on her experiences of caring for her parents in a new memoir titled Light Falls on Everything: A Daughter’s Memoir of Caregiving, Grief, and Possibility, which the University of North Carolina Press released on March 31, 2026. Here is the link to the publisher’s listing of the book: https://uncpress.org/9781469693217/light-falls-on-everything/

I contacted Rebecca and asked her for more information about her new memoir and her experiences as a Charlotte writer. Here is what she sent to me:

Light Falls on Everything: A Daughter’s Memoir of Caregiving, Grief, and Possibility, my twelfth published book, focuses on the years of caring for my elderly parents after we moved them from Indiana to Charlotte and my husband and I became the “first responders,” with support from the extended family. My parents’ deepest wish had always been to stay together “until the end,” and that is what we attempted to help them do, no matter what it took. It took a lot. As is so often the case with long-term caregiving, many days were shadowed by exhaustion, confusion, heartbreak, and anticipatory grief. Still, light flickered in even the darkest corners, revealing moments of tenderness, laughter, absurdity, surprise, and unrelenting love.

From the very beginning of the caregiving journey—which lasted nearly a decade—I felt compelled to write, if only a few notes on a hospital napkin, on the back of a pharmacy receipt, in the margins of my parents’ desk calendar. At the time, I had no idea that these scribbled notes, and later the segments and chapters that developed from them, might one day comprise a book. I was just trying to get from one day to the next, one night to the next. I now understand that this process was a way to hold myself still for a moment, just long enough to take a few steps out of the scene so I could see my parents—and myself—as characters in an ongoing, universal drama. Mother has been gone five years now; Dad, nearly a decade. And it has taken me yet another decade, since his death, to revise and shape the final book. As if any memoir is ever final. A memoir happens between two covers; it has a clear beginning and end. Life happens outside these covers, continuing its forward movement beyond the boundaries of any memoir.

For me, much of my life happens within the context of Charlotte’s writing community. My history with our “storied” city goes back nearly 50 years. In 1978, when I completed graduate studies at University of South Carolina, I moved to Charlotte to join my husband, Donald Devet, who was an instructional television producer for CMS and also a professional puppeteer, having recently co-founded Grey Seal Puppets. Before that, as a former Marine brat, I’d never lived anywhere for more than a few years at a time and I never imagined I could plant deep roots in any city.

As it turned out, I was wrong, as I so often am! Within a year, I began teaching high school English (first at Olympic and then West Charlotte) and later served as director of the Poetry-in-the-Schools program, where, for fifteen years, I taught poetry to thousands of K-12 students in 110 schools, with assistance from visiting writers including Chuck Sullivan, Ruth Moose, Charleen Swansea, Ellen Johnston-Hale, and Suzanne Newton. Happy sidebar: Two of my former high school poetry students, Julie Funderburk and Michael Sadoff, are now published writers based in Charlotte!

Meanwhile, on the home front, three of my five siblings had moved their families from California and Indiana to Charlotte, thus expanding my role of semi-professional aunt. I was also knee-deep not only in poetry but also in teacher education as part of the UNC Charlotte Writing Project, and in music, performing with the Oratorio Singers and in musicals at The Little Theatre (now called Theatre Charlotte) while also composing music for Grey Seal Puppets’ productions.

But the literary community is what formed my deepest connection to Charlotte. Nearly every writer whom Joseph Bathanti mentioned in a recent Storied Charlotte post also welcomed me, along with many others too numerous to include here. But here’s a short list of folks in poetry critique groups I was part of: First, Cathy Smith Bowers, Judy Goldman, Mary Kratt, and, in later years, Gail Peck, P.B. Newman, Irene Honeycutt, Diana Pinckney, Tony Abbott, Dede Wilson, Barbara Conrad, and Barbara Presnell. I was also connecting with other local writers including Julie Suk, Susan Ludvigson, Dannye Romine Powell, Rick Chess, Chris Davis, Robin Hemley, and Fred Leebron, and with other Carolina writers who provided support and companionship, especially once I began publishing fiction, essays, memoir, and writing craft books—among them Frye Galliard, Ron Rash, Philip Gerard, Doris Betts, and Fred Chappell.

In 1998, Donald and I took a huge personal and professional (some called it “crazy”!) leap in pursuit of a lifelong dream to live in New York City, which turned into a decade-long experience I describe in my 2020 memoir, In the Key of New York City. During that time, I also started teaching in the newly formed Queens University’s MFA program, which brought me to Charlotte for twice-yearly residencies and helped maintain my relationships here. In 2009, we moved back to Charlotte to be closer to family and to set the stage for caring for my parents, eventually moving them from Indiana to Charlotte. Thus began the eight-year caregiving experience that is at the center of my newest memoir.

I began my literary life in our “storied” city and am grateful to be continuing it with support from friends, family, students, readers, and fellow writers. Charlotte Lit will host a book launch for Light Falls on Everything: A Memoir of Caregiving, Grief, and Possibility, on Wednesday, April 22, at 6:00 p.m. at the Charlotte Lit studio (601 E. 5th Street, Suite 160). To save a seat, register here! I look forward to seeing readers of Storied Charlotte in the audience! Thanks again, Mark, for the chance to contribute to this ongoing conversation.

I congratulate Rebecca on the publication of Light Falls on Everything, and I thank her for her many contributions to Storied Charlotte’s community of readers and writers.

Tags: memoir Rebecca McClanahan

Joseph Bathanti Writes Home with News and Reminiscences

April 12, 2026 by Mark West

April is National Poetry Month, so now is an especially apropos time to touch base with Joseph Bathanti, a former North Carolina Poet Laureate and a 2024 inductee into the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame. Joseph began his career as a poet while living in Charlotte. He has long thought of Charlotte as a second home even though he no longer resides in the Queen City. As he said to me in a recent email, “I really do consider myself, among other things, a Charlotte writer, since in truth Charlotte is where I got my start all the way back in 1976 – 50 years ago this August.” When I found out that Joseph recently published several new books, I contacted him and asked him about his latest news. In his response, he provided me with the details about his new publications, but he mostly reminisced about his Charlotte years. Here is what he sent to me:

Over the past eighteen months, I’ve had four new books appear: Sempre Fidele and Other Poems (a bilingual edition of my Pittsburgh Italian American poems translated into Italian by Roman translators, Marina Morbiducci and Darcy Di Mona): https://asterismbooks.com/product/sempre-fidele-and-other-poems; a coedited volume, The Anthology of Black Mountain College Poetry: https://uncpress.org/9781469641133/the-anthology-of-black-mountain-college-poetry/; a novella, Too Glorious to Even Long for on Certain Days: https://regal-house-publishing.mybigcommerce.com/too-glorious-to-even-long-for-on-certain-days/; and, just this past February, Steady Daylight, a collection of poems, from Louisiana State University Press: https://lsupress.org/9780807185858/steady-daylight/.

Of course, I’m happy, proud and humbled by these publications. But this blog post is called Storied Charlotte and Charlotte has remained a “storied” place to me. So, apart from announcing those aforementioned books, what follows is a bit of a love letter, certainly homage, to Charlotte where, as I’ve declared any time I have the opportunity, my life as a writer and teacher began back in 1976, about a half-century ago, when I arrived in North Carolina from my hometown in Pittsburgh, fresh out of grad school, as a brand-new VISTA Volunteer assigned to the North Carolina Department of Correction to work with incarcerated men at Huntersville Prison. Big-time-foremost (understatement), however, Charlotte remains Joan’s and my very first home together, where we hatched our romance and lived in Elizabeth, after marrying.

When I first arrived in North Carolina, I was burning to write – though I knew nothing about writing except that it took a lot of longing — which I’ve always been good at. The very first place I barged into on my unlikely quest was the newsroom of The Charlotte Observer on Tryon Street downtown and presented myself to Danny Romine Powell, then Book Editor for The Observer, and offered my services as a book reviewer, something in which I had zero experience. My ultimate goal was to see my name in print and grab a free book or two in the bargain. What might I have said to Dannye that hot summer day? I must have sheepishly confided my desires. What I do remember is that she didn’t laugh and she didn’t send me packing or school me in proper etiquette as other book editors at major U.S. newspapers might have. She didn’t ask for a CV or any kind of credentials; she merely flashed a beautiful smile and welcomed me. She was decidedly bemused, but ever so warm, so friendly, and I like to think that my extra-apparent lack of knowing what the heck I was doing – unwashed and passionate upstart that I was, and Yankee to boot – instantly endeared her to me. She told me to sit, continued to smile, and asked me all about myself. The charity, generosity and affection Dannye treated me with that day exemplifies the treatment I early-on received from all the established writers in Charlotte.

Well before I owned a North Carolina driver’s license, I scored a library card at the uptown public library on Tryon Street where I first became acquainted with the magazines and periodicals I would one day publish in, though at the time nothing seemed more remote: Southern Humanities Review, Southern Poetry Review, Tar River Poetry, Carolina Quarterly, South Carolina Review. To actually see and touch those magazines, copy their editors’ names and addresses into the little pocket notebook that surely all writers carry to accommodate the capricious muse, made me feel like a writer. It wasn’t long before those rejection slips started pouring in.

After VISTA, my first job teaching was at Central Piedmont Community College. I was so green that one day in 1977, I waltzed into the office of the Chair of the English Department, Mitchell Hagler, and asked – as one might a foreman on a construction site – if he had any work. Mitchell – a powerfully kind man, now an old and cherished friend, someone who literally gave me my first break as a teacher – patiently and good-naturedly explained how one sets about snagging a job as a college teacher: the realities of CVs, letters of application, recommendations, etc., not to mention scheduling an appointment with one’s prospective employer. I can never thank Mitchell, my first academic foreman, enough.

Likewise, I owe a prodigious debt to amazing Irene Honeycutt, founder of Sensoria, and the undisputed, beloved master creative writing teacher at CPCC, a formidable poet well-known throughout Charlotte, across the state of North Carolina, and beyond. At any rate, Irene, another magnanimous long-time friend, put an arm around me, permitted and encouraged me to teach Creative Writing shortly after I arrived on campus. Her faith in me simply meant everything. What’s more, I loved and looked up to that blazing English Department at CPCC – such dedicated, brilliant, witty teachers who welcomed me instantly into their ranks.

It was also in Charlotte, during those years that Joan and I lived there (1976-1985) that I met so many other prominent writers (in addition to those already mentioned), many of whom became lifelong friends, encouraged me and invited into their circles: Tony Abbott, Julie Suk, Judy Goldman, Rebecca McClanahan, Gail Peck, Diana Pinckney, Ruth Moose, Gilda Morena Syverson, Frye Gaillard, Lew Powell, Doug Marlette, Susan Ludvigson, Dot Jackson, Mary Kratt, Dede Wilson, and so many others. I still remember the first time I heard Chuck Sullivan read his iconic poem, “Survival,” and my contemplating that liminal interstice: “up in the air / alive and well / saved in the blessed / space between / the ceiling / and the floor.”

I first found out about the Charlotte Writers Club in my religious Sunday perusal of The Observer Book Page. If you remember, it was a full two pages, with a lead book review and at least a half-dozen more of additional books, often by local writers and/or writers with ties to North Carolina. And there was also a digest of opportunities for writers. Prominent among those announcements was the list of Charlotte Writers Club activities as well as the glorious compendium of competitions – in every genre – offered by the Club. I pored over those announcements and mailed off my entry and entry-fee, regardless of the genre, then waited for results. The Charlotte Writers Club, for over a century, has been monumental in helping so very many writers launch careers and, more than anything, has created a sustaining community for so many others, those just getting a foothold in the literary world, and those still battling to do so.

By then, I had begun writing in earnest, again right there in Charlotte; and many a first draft, in my tiny hieroglyphic penmanship – which these days I can only vaguely make out with a magnifying glass – was completed on a legal pad in Jimmie’s Restaurant on Elizabeth Street across from CPCC, draining cup after cup of no-nonsense working-class coffee, indulging some of the most joyous, dreamy moments of writing in my life.

Please, never underestimate what it means to young people dreaming of, and clawing for, a foothold as a writer, the kind of smiling encouragement and validation from the likes of writers as charitable, socially engaged, humble and quietly luminous as Dannye Romine Powell and the roster of wonderful writers, the loveliest folks, I was so blessed to cross paths with when I arrived in Charlotte all those years back. I was admitted to a writing community without having to flash credentials. In fact, Charlotte was where I learned the meaning of community in all of its valence. My gratitude is endless. My life as a writer could not have happened elsewhere.

I congratulate Joseph on his recent publications, and I thank him for sharing his memories of his days in Charlotte. As far as I am concerned, Joseph will always be a valued member of the Storied Charlotte community of writers.

Tags: Joseph Bathanti

An Evening with Molly Grantham and Sarah Archer

April 04, 2026 by Mark West

Last week I received an email from Barbara (Bay) Yager, the President of the Charlotte Writers Club, in which she informed me about the club’s upcoming event featuring Charlotte authors Molly Grantham and Sarah Archer. As most everyone who lives in Charlotte knows, Molly is a former WBTV news anchor and journalist, but she is also the author of three personal memoirs: Small Victories (2017), The Juggle Is Real (2020), and Practice Makes … Progress (2023). All three books share the same subtitle: The Off-Camera Life of an On-Camera Mom. Sarah is the author of the romantic comedy The Plus One (2019) as well as numerous short stories and screenplays. As Bay mentioned in her email, Molly and Sarah are appearing together on April 14th in an event titled “The Storyteller’s Shift: A Fireside Chat with Molly Grantham and Sarah Archer.” Intrigued, I asked Bay for more information about this event. Here is what she sent to me:

Fans of Molly Grantham will have a rare opportunity to hear her story live on April 14 during a fireside chat presented by the Charlotte Writers Club as part of Charlotte SHOUT!. The event will be held in the Dubois Auditorium on the uptown campus of University of North Carolina at Charlotte, offering an engaging setting for this inspiring evening. Centered on Molly’s remarkable personal and professional journey, the conversation will explore her path from more than 20 years as an Emmy Award–winning journalist to becoming a published author, community advocate, speaker, and entrepreneur.

Joined by author Sarah Archer, Molly will share the real story behind the transition so many people dream about, but few pursue. She’ll talk candidly about leaving a high-profile newsroom role, taking creative risks, building a personal brand, and navigating the challenges of starting something new. This is an honest, engaging look at reinvention, resilience, and what it takes to step into something new.

The evening begins at 7:00 PM on April 14, with a welcoming introduction followed by the fireside conversation and a post-event book signing. Guests will have the chance to see Molly up close, hear the stories behind her success, and be inspired by her journey. Seating is limited and early ticket purchase is encouraged. Tickets are available here: tickets.

I commend the Charlotte Writers Club not only for organizing this event but also for joining forces with Charlotte SHOUT!, which is a celebration of Charlotte’s arts, culture, and community that takes place in Uptown Charlotte from April 3-19, 2026. For more information about Charlotte SHOUT!, please click on the following link: https://charlotteshout.com/ I am a fan of both the Charlotte Writers Club and Charlotte SHOUT!, and I think that they both enrich Storied Charlotte’s cultural life.

Tags: Charlotte Writers Club Molly Grantham Sarah Archer

The Spring 2026 Issue of Litmosphere

March 28, 2026 by Mark West

Every spring I look forward to the blooming of the daffodils in our flowerbed and the release of the spring issue of Litmosphere: Journal of Charlotte Lit. Both made their appearances right on time. Charlotte Lit announced the publication of the Spring 2026 issue of Litmosphere in an email sent out on March 21, and I took a look at it right away.

Kathie Collins, the Editor-in-Chief of Litmosphere, assembled an impressive team of readers to judge the submissions by 300 writers from across the country. In the end, they selected work by thirty-four writers for inclusion in the spring issue. The issue is organized into four categories: poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and flash. The issue is profusely illustrated by stunning photographs by Charlotte photographer Amy Hart.

Given my interest in Charlotte’s community of readers and writers, I kept an eye out for work by Charlotte writers. I recognized five of the writers as being from Charlotte, including two of the poets represented in the issue. Alexander Beets, a former student of mine, has a poem in the issue titled “Kingdom Come,” an emotionally charged poem that is structured around the lines from the Lord’s Prayer. Mary Alice Dixon’s poem “The Secret of the Kneading in My Sourdough Bread” also includes a response to another text with religious connotations, but in this case, the text is the Loaves & Fishes Cookbook. The fiction section includes two short stories by Charlotte writers: “The Void,” a speculative fiction story by Christopher Braniff; and “Fourth Thursday,” a story about a family Thanksgiving dinner by Ebony Morman. Finally, the nonfiction section features a personal essay titled “Roar” by Betsy West, a former architecture professor at UNC Charlotte. This essay is tied to a memoir that she is writing about her wife’s experiences as a cancer patient and her experiences as a caregiver.

The entire Spring 2026 issue of Litmosphere is available online. Read the issue here!

I congratulate Kathie and all the good folks at Charlotte Lit on the release of the latest issue of Litmosphere. With the publication of each issue of Litmosphere, Charlotte Lit makes an important contribution to the larger literary sphere that I call Storied Charlotte.

Tags: Charlotte Lit Litmosphere

Barbara Presnell’s New Memoir about Her Father, World War Two, and a Family Quest

March 21, 2026 by Mark West

Long-time Charlotte writer Barbara Presnell has a deep interest in history, and this interest is reflected in her work as a creative writer. In her poetry collection Piece Work, for example, she delves into the lives of the textile millworkers who played such an important role in the history of the South. In her latest book, however, she delves into her own personal history. Otherwise, I’m Fine: A Memoir is a moving account of her efforts to come to terms with her suppressed grief related to her father’s death in 1969 when she was fourteen years old. At the time, her mother gathered Barbara and her two siblings together and told them that it would be best for them to get on with their lives and not talk about their deceased father.

Barbara attempted to follow her mother’s advice, but the grief that she felt did not dissipate—it just stayed bottled up. Many years later, Barbara came into possession of her father’s World War II belongings, including his uniform, a scrapbook, and his letters. These tangible reminders of her father prompted Barbara and her siblings to embark on a quest to visit the places in Europe where her father was stationed during his time in the military. Otherwise, I’m Fine tells the story of this quest, but it is also a personal reflection about the history of her family and the importance of renewing family bonds.

I recently contacted Barbara and asked her for more information about her memoir. Here is what she sent to me:

The process of both living and writing the story of the book, Otherwise, I’m Fine, began in 2014 when, along with my brother and sister and two spouses, we researched, planned, and executed a 21-day tour of Europe, following our father’s maps, journal, photos, and the generous offerings of multiple guides. Our father was a WWII veteran (30th infantry division) who entered France at Omaha Beach, D-Day + 6, and was in every major battle across France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany, finally reaching the Elbe River in Magdeburg, Germany, where he and his company shook hands with officers and soldiers of the Soviet army, and the war was essentially over.

He returned from the war to marry, return to his job at the textile factory in Asheboro, and begin to raise his family. He died unexpectedly in 1969, and in order to face the practical and emotional aftermath of his death, our mother instructed us children not to dwell on his death but to move on. We took her advice to heart, and for over 30 years until her death, we did not talk about him. Our Europe trip became a resolution for unresolved grief and renewal of sibling relationships. We all healed, each in our own way.

The book parallels our Europe journey in 2014 with events before and after our father’s death. One of my goals in the telling was to bring my father back to life on the page, and I hope I did that. The University of South Carolina Press, specifically editor Michael McGandy, saw potential in an early draft and offered objective insights, particularly on structure. The book was released in April 2025. In many ways, it is a raw and vulnerable book, full of emotional highs and lows, but it has been praised for understatement (whew!) and emotional balance. It does have a happy ending. It is, of course, a poet’s memoir, with a focus on language, imagery, and suggestion.

The Charlotte launch was held at the home of Malcolm and Lauren Campbell. Members of the Charlotte writing community, of which I have long been a part, as well as UNC Charlotte faculty and Charlotte family members–my husband grew up in Charlotte and two brothers as well as our son live in Charlotte–filled the Campbell living room on a very rainy Saturday.

As you probably know, I graduated from the MFA Creative Writing program at UNCG and earned an additional degree in literature at the University of Kentucky. Mine has been a career of balancing teaching and writing. In addition to Otherwise, I’ve published five poetry books. I taught writing at UNC Charlotte for twenty years. I spent twenty years prior to that teaching writing–creative, expository, advanced, you name it–to people of all ages at colleges, community centers, state arts programs, and more.

Finally, I will point you to my website, www.barbarapresnell.com. There you’ll find reviews and links to reviews. DO take a look at the magnificent trailer made for me by a Greensboro filmmaker–https://youtu.be/XXw_IUsMGqU?si=hTg5tfcEALqcWwqB (it’s also on the website).

I congratulate Barbara on publication of Otherwise, I’m Fine: A Memoir. It’s an important addition to Storied Charlotte’s growing corpus of memorable memoirs.

Tags: Barbara Presnell memoir

North Carolina Reads Book Club Returns for Its Fifth Year

March 15, 2026 by Mark West

North Carolina Humanities sends out sends out a monthly newsletter, and the March issue came out last week. One of the articles in this newsletter is titled “North Carolina Reads March Book Club Event.” While reading this article, I realized that I had not yet covered this year’s North Carolina Reads Book Club program in my Storied Charlotte blog. Even though the program launched in February, I decided that the maxim “better late than never” applies in this case.

North Carolina Humanities is again sponsoring its North Carolina Reads Book Club. Now in its fifth year of operation, this program is a statewide book club that meets virtually on a monthly basis. I am a big supporter of North Carolina Reads in part because it fosters a sense of community among the participants. After all, discussing shared texts can bring readers together and bridge cultural differences. Another reason I support this program is that always showcases books that have deep connections to North Carolina. For readers who want to know more about North Carolina Reads, here is the official description of the program:

North Carolina Reads is North Carolina Humanities’ award-winning, virtual, statewide book club! North Carolina Reads annually features five books that explore the history and culture of North Carolina. The people, places, and events in the books offer an opportunity to reflect on how people can contribute to shaping their communities.

From February to June, North Carolina Humanities hosts virtual monthly book club discussion events where participants will hear from book authors and topic experts. Libraries, community groups, and individuals across North Carolina are encouraged to read along with North Carolina Humanities, attend North Carolina Reads book club discussions, and host their own local book programs to further conversation, camaraderie, and community.

Books, reading, literacy, and literary history are important parts of North Carolina Humanities’ mission. At the heart of North Carolina Reads is North Carolina Humanities’ desire to connect communities through shared reading experiences. Reading is vitally important because it nourishes and helps develop our critical-thinking skills, strengthens our minds, expands vocabulary, elevates mental health, and creates opportunities to explore different perspectives.

In 2023 North Carolina Reads received a national Schwartz Prize from the Federation of State Humanities Councils for its outstanding statewide impact. Since 2022, North Carolina Humanities has distributed nearly 16,000 free North Carolina Reads books and resources across the state to help increase broader access to books.

2026 North Carolina Reads Book Club Full Schedule

February 25, 2026 – Morningside: The 1979 Greensboro Massacre and the Struggle for an American City’s Soul by Aran Shetterly

March 30, 2026 – Daughters of Green Mountain Gap by Teri M. Brown

April 28, 2026 – The Devil’s Done Come Back: New Ghost Tales from North Carolina edited by Ed Southern

May 27, 2026 – The Caretaker by Ron Rash

June 23, 2026 – Night Magic: Adventures Among Glowworms, Moon Gardens, and Other Marvels of the Dark by Leigh Ann Henion

Please join us on March 30th at 6:15 for the March book club event. Author Teri M. Brown and historian Dr. Jessie Wilkerson will discuss our March book, Daughters of Green Mountain Gap.

I thank North Carolina Humanities for organizing this program and for drawing attention to these five noteworthy books. I understand that North Carolina Reads is a statewide program, but I take a certain amount of civic pride that the North Carolina Humanities is headquartered in Charlotte. As I see it, Storied Charlotte and the North Carolina Humanities for are a perfect match.

Tags: North Carolina Humanities North Carolina Reads Book Club

Roald Dahl, the Enormous Crocodile, and Me

March 10, 2026 by Mark West

Over the course of my long career as a children’s literature professor in the English Department at UNC Charlotte, I have researched the lives and works of many children’s authors, none more than Roald Dahl. My connection to Dahl goes back to 1985 when I published an article titled “Regression and the Fragmentation of the Self in James and the Giant Peach.” I thought that Dahl might be interested in the article about his book, so I sent him a copy of it. To my surprise, he wrote a letter back to me in which he made kind comments about my article. A few years later, I received a book contract to write a critical study of Dahl’s works. As part of my research for this book, I travelled to England where I spent an October day in 1988 interviewing Dahl. My book on Dahl came out in 1992, two years after Dahl’s death in 1990. Since the publication of my Dahl book, I have remained interested in Dahl, and on occasion, I have written additional pieces about him and his books.

In the past month, Dahl has re-entered my life in a big way. It started with the recent Read Aloud Rodeo that I organized. I decided to read Dahl’s picture book The Enormous Crocodile. I enjoy reading this book aloud to children because they like its fast-moving plot as well as the humor that runs throughout the story. It also gives me an opportunity to use lots of different voices. Another plus for children and for me are Quentin Blake’s amusing illustrations, which perfectly match Dahl’s zany story.

About a week after the Read Aloud Rodeo, my wife and I travelled to London. We took a day trip to Cardiff, which is where Dahl grew up. There is a plaza in Cardiff called Roald Dahl Plass, and I read that a sculpture of the Enormous Crocodile is located not too far from the plaza. I took the short walk in search of the Enormous Crocodile, and sure enough, I spotted him, looking just like Quentin Blake portrayed him in the book. As I approached the sculpture, I saw two children climbing on the crocodile’s long, bumpy back. They appeared to be a brother and a sister, which I thought was fitting since a brother and a sister have an encounter with the Enormous Crocodile in the book. I waited until the children left with their parents before I took a few photographs. When I got close up to the Enormous Crocodile, I noticed that he seemed to be peering sideways at me as if he were thinking about having me for lunch, but luckily for me, he made no effort to gobble me up.

My third recent Dahl-related experience is tied to a new ten-episode podcast called The Secret World of Roald Dahl. Aaron Tracy, the creator and host of the podcast, interviewed me about my thoughts on Dahl’s stories. We also talked about the day I spent with Dahl so many years ago. The episode featuring me, which is the concluding episode in the podcast, will be released on March 23^rd. For more information about this podcast, please click on the following link: https://www.listentoparallax.com/shows/secretworldofpodcast

Roald Dahl is but one of many children’s authors who have connections to the children’s literature program at UNC Charlotte. My colleagues who also teach in this program have published their own important research on various children’s authors and their books. This extensive body of scholarship is one of the reasons Storied Charlotte is known as a place where children’s literature is taken seriously.

Tags: Roald Dahl The Enormous Crocodile

Three Books That Relate to the History of Black Women in the South

March 01, 2026 by Mark West

I am writing this blog post on March 1, 2026, which is both the last day of Black History Month and the first day of Women’s History Month. Given this convergence, I thought today would be an appropriate time to revisit three books that relate to both of these month-long celebrations. These books are Malika J. Stevely’s Song of Redemption, Sonya Y. Ramsey’s Bertha Maxwell-Roddey: A Modern-Day Race Woman and the Power of Black Leadership, and Alicia D. Williams’s Jump at the Sun: The True Life Tale of Unstoppable Storycatcher Zora Neale Hurston. All three books are by Charlotte writers, and all relate to the history of Black women in the American South.

Song of Redemption is a historical novel. Most of the story takes place on a French and English-speaking plantation in Louisiana in the years just before the Civil War, but the opening chapter is set in 1932. In this chapter, a group of construction workers are fixing up an abandoned plantation mansion when they discover the body of a woman behind one of the walls. This event actually happened. When Malika Stevely heard about it, she became curious about the story of the woman whose body was discovered. After doing extensive investigative research, she decided to write a novel based on the life of this woman. In commenting on her approach to writing this novel, Malika said, “I wanted to humanize her as well as solve the mystery behind the oral history. This could only be done by researching and sharing her story as well as the experiences of other enslaved individuals whose names and accounts were silenced or never told. And in conjunction, it was imperative that there was a rich illustration of culture and languages in the book along with the perspectives of women, Blacks, Creoles and Creoles of color.”

Bertha Maxwell-Roddey: A Modern-Day Race Woman and the Power of Black Leadership is a biography of a living legend in Charlotte’s educational circles. Bertha Maxwell-Roddey founded UNC Charlotte’s Black Studies Program (which eventually evolved into the current Africana Studies Department). Before joining UNC Charlotte’s College of Education in 1970, she had an illustrious career as a teacher and principal in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School System. When asked to comment on this biography, Sonya Ramsey said her book is “not just a biography of a phenomenal woman. It represents the untold story of Black women and others who fought to turn the promises and achievements of the civil rights and feminist movements into tangible realities as they fought to make desegregation work in the quiet aftermath of the public civil rights marches and the fiery speeches of Black Power activists in the board rooms and classrooms of the desegregated south from the 1970s to the 1990s.”

Jump at the Sun: The True Life Tale of Unstoppable Storycatcher Zora Neale Hurston is picture book biography of folklorist and writer Zora Neale Hurston. The book is written by Alicia D. Williams and illustrated by Jacqueline Alcántara. In this book, Alicia shows how Hurston’s experiences growing up in Eatonville, Florida, during the 1890s shaped her interest in African American folklore and sparked her love of storytelling. Alicia focuses much of the book on Hurston’s childhood and early adulthood, but she touches on Hurston’s career as a folklorist, anthropologist and professional writer. One of Alicia’s goals in writing this book is to introduce children to the joys that come with sharing folktales. As she told an interviewer, “I want this whole engagement of bringing back the storytelling and oral traditions and sharing them and having fun with them.”

While I have previously written individual blog posts about these books when they first came out, I think that it is good to write about them together in one post, for it seems to me that these books are in conversation with each other. These books tell individual stories, but they all contribute to a larger narrative about the contributions of Black women to the history of America. Since these books are by Charlotte writers, they also contribute to the literary history of Storied Charlotte.

Tags: Black History Month Women's History Month

Celebrating Book Clubs and Read Alouds

February 23, 2026 by Mark West

The act of reading is often solitary in nature, but it need not be. Reading books together can help forge connections and build a sense of community. Two upcoming events in Charlotte underscore how reading can be a social experience. The Charlotte Mecklenburg Library’s Book Club Madness month-long event provides Charlotte’s many book clubs with an opportunity to participate a community-wide competition, and the annual Read Aloud Rodeo helps children experience the joy of hearing picture books being read aloud.

I contacted Maggie Bean, the Director of Marketing and Communications with the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation, and I asked her for more information about Book Club Madness. Here is what she sent to me:

This March, the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation is once again turning page-turners into point-scorers with the return of Book Club Madness, a free, community-wide competition that transforms local book clubs into friendly rivals.

Now in its fourth year, Book Club Madness runs March 4 – 24 and invites book clubs (and even solo readers) across Mecklenburg County to compete in library and reading challenges. Participants earn points by visiting Library branches, checking out books and e-books, engaging with Library staff and completing themed activities. Scores are tallied as two-pointers, three-pointers and free throws, with even a playful “technical foul” in the mix.

Members must register online by March 2 to participate.

Grand prize winners will receive a table for up to ten at the Library Foundation’s annual Verse & Vino gala, as well as a group workshop package from SkillPop and weekly prizes from local bookstores Park Road Books, Main Street Books and Troubadour Booksellers.

And this year brings something new.

Responding to participant requests to connect beyond email and leaderboards, the Foundation is launching its first ever in-person Book Club Madness event: Not So Heated Rivalries, taking place Saturday, March 21 at 2 p.m. at SouthPark Regional Library.

The live event brings the March Madness bracket to life (but with books instead of basketballs.) Book clubs will go head-to-head in “book battles,” each team delivering a short pitch for a favorite title as audience members vote to decide which books advance. The competition continues until one champion is crowned. Attendees can expect audience voting, giveaways, refreshments and bonus Book Club Madness points.

Learn more at https://foundation.cmlibrary.org/events/book-club-madness/not-so-heated-rivalries/

The third annual Read Aloud Rodeo, a read-aloud story-time event, will take place at Park Road Books (4139 Park Road) from noon to 1:30 on Saturday, February 28, 2026. At the Read Aloud Rodeo, children’s authors, local educators and literacy advocates will participate in a marathon reading of picture books aloud to children.

The Read Aloud Rodeo is tied to the National Education Association’s Read Across America Week, which traditionally kicks off on the second day of March in honor of Dr. Seuss’s birthday. For more information about Read Across America Week, please click on the following link: https://www.nea.org/professional-excellence/student-engagement/read-across-america

I invite everyone to participate in these book-related events. As I see it Book Club Madness and the Read Aloud Rodeo are but two of many ways in which the good people of Storied Charlotte can come together over good books.

Tags: Book Club Madness Read Aloud Rodeo