Storied Charlotte

The Story of Theatre Charlotte Is Not Over

January 19, 2021 by Mark West

Drama plays an integral role in our literary tradition just as theatre plays an integral role in the history of Storied Charlotte. For over ninety years, Theatre Charlotte has figured prominently in this history. Since its founding in 1927, Theatre Charlotte has survived some difficult years, including the Great Depression years and the World War Two years, but 2020 stands out as an especially trying year for Theatre Charlotte. First the pandemic caused the cancellation of most of its performances, and then a fire broke out on December 28 causing major damage to Theatre Charlotte’s 216-seat auditorium located at 501 Queens Road. Theatre Charlotte’s staff, volunteers, and community supporters are determined to overcome this latest setback.

Theatre Charlotte has started a “Relief Fund” to rebuild their auditorium. As is stated on their website, “Theatre Charlotte’s auditorium was severely damaged in an electrical fire on December 28, 2020. We’ve been hit pretty hard by 2020, but physical damage to our physical home is something we simply could not have expected. We’re still taking inventory of what we lost. But we do know one thing: to find ourselves again, we need your support. Every dollar raised will help Theatre Charlotte survive this crisis.”

I contacted a number of people associated with Theatre Charlotte, and I asked them to send me a statement about what Theatre Charlotte means to them and why they are supporting the efforts to rebuild the fire-damaged auditorium. Their responses are listed below.

Pat Heiss has been a part of the Charlotte theater scene for many years. She has performed in numerous Theatre Charlotte productions and has served as the President of the Board for Theater Charlotte. She wrote:

In 1961, I was new to Charlotte and interested in theater. A friend introduced me to the Little Theatre of Charlotte, and there I found a true community theater that welcomed everyone interested in theater, regardless of talent or status. I felt at home. I was a novice, but I learned that to put a production together required hard work and community volunteerism. There was always something to do, and I volunteered for any task that required a body. I had a great time learning the ins-and-outs of the “business” by hands-on experience working on show props, sound, lighting, make-up, and even worked in some stage managing. I had my first stage roll in 1963, and I was “hooked” on theater for good. I love the feel, smell and atmosphere of theater, and the joy and excitement of providing an entertaining show that, for a few hours, takes an audience to new places and experiences. Decades have passed since I started my theatrical adventure, and I have performed at numerous other venues, but I will always consider where I started, Theatre Charlotte, as my “home.” The Theater recently experienced an electrical fire that has shut down all performances, and of course, Covid-19 had put its boot on the entertainment neck of the nation. This hurdle must be overcome before the Theater can reopen its doors, but with the community’s support I’m confident that it will, and when that day comes, as it always has, Theatre Charlotte will lay out the mat that says, “Welcome, please come in!”

Rick Moll is a senior lecturer and the Master Electrician for UNC Charlotte’s College of Arts + Architecture. He is also a member of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. He wrote:

I was 23 and one year out of college when I did my first show at Theatre Charlotte. Professionally, it gave me production credits very early in my career when my resume (frankly) was pretty threadbare. I did five shows in various capacities over the next year. It allowed me to ply my craft and build a name for myself in the overall community. I met a circle of friends doing that show that was my tribe for the next five years. My 20s, personally and professionally, were rooted in the community I found there. I learned early on it’s not just the work, it’s the people. In 2010, I found my way back and have worked on a dozen productions over the last ten years. As a Lecturer at UNC Charlotte, I have sent students to 501 Queens to build experiences on their resumes (as performers and technicians), hoping they can find in their journey the same things I found along mine. Legacy — that’s the gift Theatre Charlotte gives this community. It was here before us and it will be here after we are gone. ACE, Charlotte Rep, Bare Bones, Charlotte Shakespeare, innovative theatre, Off Tryon, Queen City Theatre, Stage One– these were all fantastic groups from Charlotte’s arts past. CPCC, Actor’s Theatre, Children’s Theatre and Three Bone are the current torchbearers in this town. Through all these groups, there has been Theatre Charlotte- providing rehearsal space, performance space, props, costumes along the way- carrying itself while carrying others. I want to see the Theatre Charlotte Centennial in 2027.

Victoria Perras is the Head of Wardrobe for the Blumenthal Performing Arts/Belk Theater. She is also a member of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. She wrote:

I have spent a lot of hours in the last couple of days thinking about all my years at Theatre Charlotte and what they meant to me. I first became involved with the theater in the early 1980s when I was invited to join the Ladies Auxiliary. In those days the auxiliary actually worked in the box office, answering the phones, making reservations and pulling the tickets for the show. After a couple of years, Keith Martin, the Executive Director of the theater asked me if I would be interested in working backstage. I explained that I had two kids, about 11 and 12, too young not to have a babysitter but too old to think they needed one. In the true sense of community theater, Keith said “bring them in and we’ll put them to work.”. We had a great time working on the show, building sets, painting, learning everything there was to putting on a show. We all ended up on the show crew. My daughter, Elizabeth was the Asst. Asst. Stage Manager on stage right and Donald on stage left. The show, “Something’s Afoot” had a lot of sight gags and we all had some of them to do. It was a great experience! However, watching my son load smoke pots with black powder and steel wool took a few years off me, I also watched the Technical Director at that time, Vernon Carroll, teach him how to do it with all proper safety guidelines and realized how valuable a community organization like Theatre Charlotte can be and how much they can enrich lives. My kids and I did several shows together over the next couple of years. They went on to “teenagedom” and other interests but I found a life time love for live theater that has never dimmed. We need to anything we can to help this Grand Old Lady.

Gordon Olson is currently a Lecturer in Lighting Design at UNC Charlotte. He has been involved with the lighting of over ninety productions, including many at Theatre Charlotte. He wrote:

Having been a part of numerous productions at Theatre Charlotte, I was horrified and saddened to hear of the recent fire the theatre experienced. I have a deep admiration for the space, and more importantly the extraordinary passion and talent of those who inhabit it. At the very heart of the organization, people like Ron Law, and Chris and Jackie Timmons care so deeply about the idea of providing high quality, accessible theatre to the greater Charlotte community that it’s heartbreaking to consider the idea of the organization having to turn off it’s ghost light forever. I’ve been fortunate enough to work as both a scenic and lighting designer for many productions these last ten years of my life in Charlotte and each production has been a wonderful, soul-nourishing experience of collaborative effort, artistic output, and high-level performative talent on display. Seeing the ongoing commitment of the volunteers that Theatre Charlotte has in its ranks, to keep the theatre functioning, producing, and striving for more never ceases to inspire me when I walk through the doors for a long day of rehearsal, or diving into the chaos that is “tech week” prior to opening night. The staff and talent at TC never shy away from doing challenging work and approach each production with unwavering enthusiasm with the goal of putting up the best possible show. I sincerely hope that Theatre Charlotte is able to weather this storm and come out on the other side better than ever. I look forward to helping in any manner I can to keep the doors open and keeping the stage lights on.

Louanne Delaney has been part of the Theatre Charlotte family for many years from backstage to front of house. She works at a local law firm by day and Theatre Charlotte on nights and weekends. She wrote:

I can’t believe it’s been 22 years since I first walked in the door to Theatre Charlotte. From backstage crew to stage manager to house manager – and so much in between. I’ve gotten to know many actors, crew, volunteers and patrons over the years, many on a personal level, and many I see on a regular basis. And I know it’s the same for others. When I heard the news about the fire I was heartbroken! I can’t image it not being there. So many memories, so many friends! There are many things that will need to be done, but there are also many people who want to see it happen. Theatre Charlotte means so much to so many people. Theatre Charlotte means so much to me in so many ways. It’s the best thing that has happened to me. It’s my heart’s home.

As the above statements reflect, Theatre Charlotte has contributed a great deal to the culture of Charlotte since it performed its first production in 1928. However, in order for it to continue to be a player in the grand drama that is Storied Charlotte, it needs the support of the community. For those who are interested in helping Theatre Charlotte rebuild its fire-damaged auditorium, please click on the following link: https://theatrecharlotte.salsalabs.org/2020/index.html

Tags: Theatre Charlotte

Providing Charlotte’s Children with Books of Their Own

January 11, 2021 by Mark West

My parents owned thousands of books. The tallest wall in our living room soared sixteen feet high, and the entire wall was covered with packed bookshelves. My father had to stand on the very top rung of a stepladder and then reach as high as he could to take a book off of the top shelf. My parents are no longer with us, but that wall of books still exists. Throughout the rest of the house there were other packed bookshelves. I had access to these books, but I knew that they belonged to my parents.

The books that meant the most to me during my childhood were my own books. I had the opportunity to select and buy books at school book fairs and occasional trips to bookstores, and I treasured these books. In fact, I still own some of them, such as E. B. White’s Stuart Little and A. A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh. I now know that I was a lucky boy. Many children, including thousands of children who live in Charlotte, grow up in homes bereft of books. These children do not have books to call their own. Promising Pages, a nonprofit organization located in Charlotte, is doing something to address this problem.

Founded by Kristina Cruise in 2011, Promising Pages collects new and donated books shares them with children living in Charlotte homes where there are few if any books. Kristina stepped away from Promising Pages at the end of 2018, leaving the organization in the capable hands of experienced nonprofit professionals Eric Law (Executive Director) and Kelly Cates (Deputy Director). I recently contacted Eric and asked him why he took on the role of leading this organization. Here is what he sent to me:

I was born into a multigenerational family of educators and raised in Charlotte. Growing up as the sons of a college professor and a bookstore manager, my brother and I took it for granted that we always had books at home and were introduced to reading early. As I got older, I realized that many of our peers did not have that privilege. I want to ensure that every child in my hometown gets the same advantage that I did. I am driven by the positive impact that book ownership can have on children.

Our mission is to provide ownership of books to underserved children and cultivate a lifelong love of reading through innovative literacy programs and partnerships. We envision a world where all children have adequate reading materials at home, can see themselves reflected in the books they read, and have made reading a joyful habit for a lifetime.

Promising Pages is still a relatively young organization. We are working diligently to strengthen our infrastructure and to increase the impact of our programs and services for the long term. Our overarching priority is to fulfill our mission by sharing even more books with underserved students in our community. Promising Pages has experienced tremendous growth in recent years, sharing more than 190,000 books in each of the last two July-June time periods. Many child-serving and literacy- focused organizations have come to rely on us as their main source for books, but we know the need is much greater.

While we expect that the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools will continue to be our primary avenue for sharing books with students, we are strategically partnering with organizations focused on housing, food insecurity, and with other area schools and school districts. Through these efforts we will be able to serve more students, help non-literacy focused organizations support the families they serve, and help us broaden our base of community support. As we continue to grow, we expect that Promising Pages will be widely known as the primary go-to source for children’s books in our area, and as an organization that plays a leading role in sustaining and enhancing the attention paid to the issue of children’s literacy.

We are also working intentionally to acquire more diverse and representative books to share with the students we serve, 90% of whom are children of color. Children should not only get to choose the books they read, but should also see themselves mirrored in those books. Representation matters.

As Promising Pages approaches its tenth anniversary in September 2021, we are focused on becoming a more mature, capable, and sustainable organization that will have a steadily growing positive impact on our community for decades to come.

For more information about Promising Pages, please click on the following link: https://promising-pages.org

I commend Eric and the other staff members and volunteers associated with Promising Pages for providing so many Charlotte children with their own books. In so doing, Promising Pages is making an important contribution countless children’s lives and to the continued vitality of Storied Charlotte.

Tags: Promising Pages

Kevin Winchester and His Southern Gothic Novel

January 04, 2021 by Mark West

I first became interested in Southern Gothic literature years before I moved to the South. I discovered Erskine Caldwell’s Tobacco Road (1932)and God’s Little Acre (1933) during my undergraduate studies at the now-defunct Franconia College, which was located in northern New Hampshire. Although I was living in the middle of Yankee country, I enjoyed reading Caldwell’s novels about life in the rural South. In many ways, these novels are all about the characters’ emotional connections to the land. Caldwell’s eccentric and flawed characters intrigued me. Since these characters live on the fringes of society, their experiences reveal sides of Southern culture that are often kept out of view. When I originally read these books, I hadn’t yet heard of the term Southern Gothic. However, I later learned that this term has come to be associated with Caldwell’s novels and other stories about eccentric (sometimes grotesque) characters who live in the South and who wrestle with the complexities of Southern culture and traditions.

I thought about Caldwell’s novels and the Southern Gothic tradition when I discovered Kevin Winchester recent debut novel, Sunflower Dog: Dancing the Flathead Shuffle. I see Kevin’s novel as belonging to this same tradition, but I wondered if Kevin would agree with me, so I sent him an email and asked him. In his response, he said, “Absolutely, I think Sunflower Dog is definitely Southern Gothic.”

Like the characters in Caldwell’s novels, the central characters in Sunflower Dog have deep ties to the land. Also, like Caldwell’s characters, Kevin’s eccentric characters exist on the fringes of society. In the case of Sunflower Dog, these characters live on the fringes of Charlotte. Kevin currently lives near Charlotte in the community of Waxhaw, and he earned his MFA in creative writing from Queens University in Charlotte. For more information about Kevin and his publications, please click on the following link: https://www.kevinwinchesterwriter.com

Kevin draws on his familiarity with the Charlotte region in creating his cast of quirky characters. These characters include a small-town entrepreneur, an aspiring reality TV star and her doting but tough-as-nails grandmother, a young couple who are expecting a child, a pair of inept weed growers, a college professor whose career is not going well, and, of course, a dog. These characters all get caught up in a messy real-estate deal that is both funny and poignant. I recently contacted Kevin and asked him for more information about these characters. Here is what he sent to me:

Sunflower Dog was released in April of 2020, but it is set in 2008/9 against the national backdrop of Obama’s election and the Great Recession, and the Charlotte region’s real estate boom and its ensuing population explosion. The characters in Sunflower Dog—all local “natives”—are trying to figure out how to navigate all the changes happening around them.

To anyone from the area, it quickly becomes obvious the book’s fictional Mason County represents Union County. I was born in the county but headed for bigger and brighter as soon as possible. When I first began thinking of moving back to Union County, I told my wife we should drive out to an area I always liked to see if any land or houses might be for sale. A couple of turns later I thought I was lost. The dirt road I wanted, the one I remembered from high school that featured Ghost Bridge, the site of bonfires and beers every Friday and Saturday night, was paved. Housing developments sprouted from pastureland, and when I threw my hand up at passing traffic—a Southern and especially Union County tradition—no one waved back. Charlotte, and all things Charlotte, had spilled across the County line. I didn’t know how I felt about that.

Neither do the characters in Sunflower Dog. Most of the characters are long-time residents. A few are multi-generational—as the saying goes: their tap root ran deep, especially the main character, Salvador Hinson, and one of his cohorts, Ethel, the crusty grandmother of the story. All are trying to redefine who they are and how they are to exist as their familiar world, a world filled with traditions and customs good and bad, connections to the land, a sense of the past—theirs and the regions, careens toward the future. They’re on the fringe, stuck between urban and rural, big city and red-dirt country.

Union County, like most counties surrounding Mecklenburg, or probably any urban area that is experiencing growth, is divided geographically in a way that reflects all of this. For instance, in Union County (and the book’s Mason County), Highway 601 north of Monroe and Highway 200 south of Monroe act as a demographic line of demarcation. West of those two highways, the Mecklenburg county side, is more affluent, crowded with two-story housing developments and traffic, abundant shopping and dining options. East of those two highways, the landscape is open farmland, trailers, mom and pop businesses, and a slower pace in general. What moves toward the center pushes something to the fringes.

There is a natural conflict in those fringes: the ancestral locals pitted against the newcomers. There are plenty of Southern Lit books that feature those conflicts. Sunflower Dog is more interested in the internal conflict this newness creates in those being pushed toward the fringes. Those folks have a choice, or choices, to make. What traditions do they hang on to? Which ones should they discard? Is there really a connection to The Land; a standard trope in Southern fiction? And as the area inevitably becomes more urban…and more urbane…what happens to the traditional, Southern Gothic characters? Not “characters” in the sense of fiction, but characters as people; those quirky, hard-headed, determined, proud, uniquely intelligent, often peculiar folks we Southerners have always celebrated. In short, those fringe characters have long enriched all that is the “Southern experience,” and they are an integral part of all generational Southerners. Those not from the South viewed, still view, those characters as humorous, as jokes even, and not without reason. In Sunflower Dog, I wanted that comical aspect to shine through, but I also believe there is something beautiful and necessary in those fringe characters. If…when…those characters disappear, the collective We will have lost something more than just our Southern-ness. I hoped to preserve some of that in Sunflower Dog.

As the publication of Kevin’s Sunflower Dog demonstrates, the Southern Gothic tradition is alive and well. Contemporary Charlotte, with its gleaming skyscrapers and international airport, might not seem like a conducive setting for a Southern Gothic novel. However, Kevin shows us that you don’t have to travel very far beyond Charlotte’s city limits to find a world that’s perfectly suited for a Southern Gothic story. As I see it, Sunflower Dog is set on the fringes of the city, but it is still part of Storied Charlotte.

Tags: Southern Gothic literature

Rebecca McClanahan Goes to New York City

December 21, 2020 by Mark West

My father grew up in New York City. He spent most of his boyhood living in a Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn, and that experience shaped his taste in movies. He loved movies set in New York, and he especially loved the New York movies written by Neil Simon. He felt a special bond with Simon in part because they shared a birthday. My father was born on July 4, 1928, and Simon was born on July 4, 1927. I remember going with my father to see Simon’s The Out-of-Towners as soon as it came out in 1970, and I have loved the movie ever since. The movie stars Jack Lemmon and Sandy Dennis, and it deals with a middle-aged couple (Gwen and George Kellerman) who leave their home in Ohio and go to New York so that George can interview for a new job. What follows is a series of hilarious mishaps that tests the couple and changes their perspective.

I thought about The Out-of-Towners when I discovered In the Key of New York City: A Memoir in Essays by Charlotte writer Rebecca McClanahan. Published by Red Hen Press in September 2020, this book is Rebecca’s eleventh book and her second memoir. Like Gwen and George Kellerman, Rebecca and her husband, Donald Devet, left the security of their comfortable home and headed off to New York City to explore new possibilities. Rebecca and Donald were about the same age as the Kellermans when they went to New York in 1998, but unlike the Kellermans, they ended up staying in the Big Apple for eleven years. Rebecca and Donald, like the Kellermans, approached New York from the perspective of outsiders, and this perspective helped them notice details that native New Yorkers often ignore as they bustle about their business. Rather than provide a chronological record of her years in New York, Rebecca writes focused essays in which she delves into particular moments and events. I recently contacted Rebecca and asked her for more information about In the Key of New York City. Here is what she sent to me:

When my husband and I moved from Charlotte to New York in 1998, it was a midlife leap into the unknown. We’d talked for decades about living in the city someday and had visited New York whenever we could. Then one day, while we were walking on 8th Avenue celebrating Donald’s 50th birthday, I surprised myself by saying, “If we’re going to make the move, we better make it now.” That was in May, and by August we had put our house on the market, stored the possessions we had not given away, found a furnished sublet, left our jobs, and said goodbye to family and friends—and even to our cat! Neither of us is impulsive by nature, but I guess the urge was strong. We figured that with the sale of the house and our savings, we could make it for two years if we didn’t find jobs there. We ended up staying for eleven.

In the Key of New York Cityis a memoir-in-essays about the first several years of our time there. We were newcomers, outsiders, and, as is the case with most outsiders, our senses were heightened as we struggled to navigate an alien landscape. Despite my training as a military brat who moved often during childhood, I was extremely lonely at the beginning, or maybe homesick is a better word for it. We’d been comfortable in our North Carolina lives and I missed that easy comfort. I missed my home and garden, my friends and family, my students and colleagues in the writing community.

Making a community in New York was a tough learning experience, but little by little we made connections—through our new jobs, mostly, and by reconnecting with New York area friends we’d lost track of over the years. But much of the growing feeling of connection came from the constant interaction with strangers. This was due in part to street activity—with walking rather than driving, encountering diverse faces close-up and personal, hearing the broth of languages on our walks, sharing subway seats or park benches, and learning how to give each person we met their own valuable space. It may sound strange, but I discovered a new form of intimacy in those encounters. I felt part of a world much larger than myself, my neighborhood, or my circle of friends. I hadn’t expected the intensity of this feeling and it surprised and comforted me. So, sprinkled among the longer essays in the book are brief moments that suggest these connections: an encounter on the subway involving two sleeping children, the drunken young man on 8th avenue holding a dying pigeon out to me as if I might save it, the post 9/11 park scene where I see a Muslim woman in a headscarf running toward a child who is in danger. All of these encounters, and more, forced me to imagine what New York—or, indeed, our nation—might look like if we all, horror of horrors, went “back where we came from.”

The book opens and closes with scenes of Central Park. The park bench was such an important part of my experience of New York—not only as my own physical (if temporary) stake on the landscape and a place from which to view the scene, but also as an opportunity for conversations with strangers who were always eager to share their stories and their odd but intriguing wisdom. A park bench is where public and private meet, which echoes my experience of the city. The book moves between the public and the private, the joyous and the sorrowful (9/11, my cancer surgery and recovery, moments of loneliness and regret) and the present and the past.

The title (“In the Key…”) is of course related to music, and music weaves its way throughout the book: in sounds heard through apartment walls, the cacophony of the streets and subways, the music I hear during the 9/11 prayer service, and even in the hospital essay when I hear the dying man’s wife echoing his cries—an opera of shared pain. Music touches the deepest parts of our experience; it transcends language. Which is why music is such an important part of the book.

In another way, though, the “key” to New York could also be seen as an object, something that opens the door into a new experience. That is what I hope the book might do for readers, not only those readers with connections to New York. I hope that the book’s reach extends to anyone who has ever been uprooted or who has felt like a newcomer or outsider, who has longed for connection, and who has been lucky enough to experience a place that changed them in remarkable ways. Maybe that’s reaching too high, but that was my aim in writing the book. I am grateful to each and every reader. Readers make books possible. Thank you, Mark, for the opportunity to talk about my book.

Rebecca and Donald, like the Kellmans, have returned home. Rebecca is maintaining her connections in Charlotte, including teaching in The Queens MFA program, and Donald is working as a video producer here in Charlotte. Rebecca is having great success in her writing career, the details of which can be found on her website: http://www.rebeccamcclanahanwriter.com

Rebecca still sees herself as a Charlotte writer, but her experinces living in New York have rippled through her writing career in a variety of ways. Her embrace of both Charlotte and New York is reflected in the fact that she is the recipent of fellowships from both the North Carolina Arts Council and the New York Foundation for the Arts. As I see it, Rebecca’s new book adds an appealing New-York-City vibe to Storied Charlotte.

Tags: essays memoir

Allison Hutchcraft, Henry David Thoreau, and the Art of Nature Writing

December 14, 2020 by Mark West

I first read Henry David Thoreau’s Walden; or Life in the Woods during my high school years in Colorado. There’s a pond on mountainside where I grew up, and I decided to emulate Thoreau and write about the pond, just like Thoreau wrote about Walden Pond. I perched on the bank for about an hour, watching the occasional dragonfly zip through the cluster of cattails near where I sat, and then I got restless. As much as I admired Thoreau’s writing, I realized that I lacked the discipline and powers of perception to be a nature writer. Still, I appreciate writers who are attuned to the rhythms of nature and who can help us understand our place in the natural world. One such writer is Charlotte poet Allison Hutchcraft. For more information about Allison and her poetry, please click on the following link: https://www.allisonhutchcraft.com

I met Allison about six years ago. At the time, she had just had a poem published in the Kenyon Review about a dodo bird. I remember reading the poem and then talking with her about her ability to make readers care about an extinct bird. I have followed her career ever since and have taken pleasure in seeing her poetry gain national attention. I am pleased to report the recent publication of Swale, Allison’s first poetry collection. I contacted Allison and asked her for more information about her collection. Here is what she sent to me:

I’m thrilled to share that my first poetry collection, Swale, was released this November by the good folks at New Issues Poetry & Prose. The book looks outward to the natural world, and also inward to the landscape of the mind. In Swale, water and land meet and mix, and at times become confused. Sailors hallucinate the ocean as a field. Ancient coastal forests, having fallen into the sea from shifting tectonic plates, reappear on a beach, unburied by erosion.

In my work, I often find animals appearing, from bears, horses, and lambs to whales and manatees. In Swale, there are extinct species, too, particularly the dodo and Steller’s sea cow, which went extinct roughly in the 1680s and 1760s, respectively. Human intervention set in motion those extinctions, and I’m interested in thinking about those losses, and the kinds of worldviews that made them possible.

In 2018, I was lucky to be a resident at the Sitka Center for Art and Ecology on the Oregon coast. Sitka is a dream of a residency, and quite remote: perched where the Salmon River estuary spills into the sea, and steps from a national scenic research area. I saw more elk than people. Being in that particular place—walking the woods and coastlines, climbing over boulders, touching rockweed, lichen, and driftwood—was incredibly generative, and brought forth poems that grew incrementally from daily observations. Such writing in the field is crucial to me. At the same time, I love research. Reading about the fur trade in the Pacific Northwest, for instance, led me to the naturalist Georg Wilhelm Steller’s study of the sea cow, which in turn led to a poem.

I am particularly interested in the ways in which art and science meet and what questions and conversations such crossings might foster. I often think of Rob Nixon’s Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor, in which he advocates for finding ways to bring the disasters of the Anthropocene into our shared consciousness. Nixon writes:

“In an age when the media venerate the spectacular, when public policy is shaped primarily around perceived immediate need, a central question is strategic and representational: how can we convert into image and narrative the disasters that are slow moving and long in the making, disasters that are anonymous and star nobody, disasters that are attritional and of indifferent interest to the sensation-driven technologies of our image-world?”

This, to me, is an urgent call: how can we begin to make visible the precariousness of our world? Poetry, I think, offers one way to do so.

Even though Allison’s Swale is a work of poetry while Thoreau’s Walden is a work of prose, both writers have much in common. For both of them, nature writing is an immersive act. Both are keen observers of the dynamics of the natural world, and both reflect in profound ways on how humans interact with nature. Both have an appreciation of place, and they communicate their appreciation of place through the power of their writing. In many ways, Allison Hutchcraft is Storied Charlotte’s own 21^st-century Thoreau.

Tags: Nature writer poetry

Charlotte Art Books

December 07, 2020 by Mark West

I like coffee, and I like books, and I don’t have anything against tables. However, I don’t especially like the term coffee table book. When I come across this term, it causes me to associate a book with a glorified coaster or a saucer for a coffee cup. I prefer to use the term art book when I am referring to a book that features photographs and reproductions of visual images.

I enjoy perusing art books. I like the way the images and the text work together. I also like the way the images in an art book relate to the other images in the book. I often have sense that the images are speaking to each other in a synergistic way, and I know that this experience is no accident. Like the curator of an art exhibit, the creator of an art book puts a great deal of thought into the arrangement and presentation of the images in the book. I am pleased to report the recent publication of several art books that have associations with Charlotte. For the purposes of this blog post, I will focus on three such books.

Anne Neilson’s Angels came out last month, and it features 40 full-color reproductions of Neilson’s well-known angel paintings. Often described as “ethereal,” these oil paintings reflect Neilson’s skill in playing with light, color and texture. The wings on her angels are usually created by the thick application of oil paints, and this technique gives these angel wings a three-dimensional quality. The book also includes “inspirational devotions” in keeping with Neilson’s Christian religious beliefs. Neilson is a Charlotte-based artist and owner of Anne Neilson Fine Art, an art gallery located in Charlotte.

Charlotte: The Signs of the Times reflects photographer Christopher Lawing’s passion for Charlotte’s iconic signs. He first took an interest in photographing these signs while still a student at Myers Park High School, and for the next seven years he continued to photograph and research the history of Charlotte’s historic signs. In this lavishly illustrated book, Lawing brings together photographs of over 100 distinctive Charlotte signs, many of which are associated with important Charlotte landmarks, including Ratcliffe’s Flowers, the World Famous Open Kitchen, and Mr. K’s Soft Ice Cream. For each of the photographed signs, Lawing provides information about the sign’s location, the history of the business associated with the sign, and a note about the sign’s current status. Sadly, some of the physical signs no longer exists, but they live on in Lawing’s book.

Classic Black: The Basalt Sculpture of Wedgwood and His Contemporaries is by Brian D. Gallagher, the Curator of Decorative Arts at the Mint Museum. This book functions as a catalog for the Mint Museum’s current “Classic Black” exhibit, which can be seen at the museum’s Randolph Road location. However, the book also functions as a stand-alone celebration of black basalt sculptures and ornamental wares. Classic Black includes 254 color illustrations of busts, statues, vases, cameos, and other works created out of black basalt. In the words of a reviewer from the Wall Street Journal, this is “a handsomely illustrated catalog written by Mr. Gallagher, with contributions by several eminent colleagues in the field.”

For readers who are interested in checking out other art books that are tied to Charlotte, I suggest that they visit the gift shops at the area art museums. In some cases, Charlotte’s art museums still have the catalogs for temporary exhibits, such as the Mint Museum’s 2011 ground-breaking exhibit titled “Romare Bearden: Southern Recollections.” These museum catalogs, along with the various art books created by Charlotte painters and photographers, add a rich visual dimension to the ever-expanding library of books that make up Storied Charlotte.

Tags: art books coffee table books

Visiting the American West Via Charlotte

November 30, 2020 by Mark West

I have lived in Charlotte for most of my adult years, but I grew up in the American West. My parents bought the side of a mountain in Colorado’s Front Range back in the early 1950s, and that mountain served as my backyard until I headed off to college at the age of seventeen. Given my Colorado connections, I have long had a particular fondness for books set in the West. I am not the only resident of Charlotte who is drawn to the American West as a setting for stories. Two of my creative writing colleagues in the English Department at UNC Charlotte—Aaron Gwyn and Bryn Chancellor—set much of their fiction in the American West.

Aaron Gwyn grew up on a ranch in Oklahoma, and his familiarity with the American Southwest is reflected in many of his stories, including his new novel, All God’s Children: A Novel of the American West. Set largely in Texas between 1827 and 1847, All God’s Children braids together the stories of three characters: Duncan Lammons, an adventurer from Kentucky who is riddled with a sense of guilt because of his homosexual desires; Cecelia, an African American woman who grew up as a slave in Virginia; and Sam Fisk, a frontiersman from Arkansas. These three characters come together on the Texas frontier, where they form a complex relationship. Their lives are shaped by the transformation of Texas from a province of Mexico to an independent republic to becoming the 28^th state in 1845.

All God’s Children just came out in October, but reviewers are already praising it for its portrayal of the American West. The reviewer for the New York Times Book Review celebrates the novel for its “powerful depiction of the rough realities of frontier life.” The reviewer for Lone Star Literary Life writes, “Gwyn possesses a distinctive voice that is, nevertheless, a recognizably Western rhythm,” and the reviewer for Publishers Weekly calls the book “a masterpiece of Western fiction.”

Bryn Chancellor spent many of her formative years in Arizona. She often sets her stories Arizona, including her debut novel, Sycamore, which came out in 2017. The title is the name of the small town in Arizona where the novel takes place. Told from the points of view of multiple residents of the town, this novel focuses on a young woman who mysteriously disappeared from the town in 1991. Sycamore garnered starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, O: The Oprah Magazine, The Library Journal and many other influential periodicals at the time of its publication. Bryn is now writing two more books set in Arizona. I recently contacted her and asked for more information about these new works. Here is what she sent to me:

I am working on two books both set in the American Southwest, where I lived for thirty-five years and where my family still resides. The first is People of Earth, twelve linked short stories (sometimes called a story cycle or composite novel) set in the same downtown Phoenix neighborhood. The second is Soon, Mercy, an epistolary novel set in Oak Creek Canyon north of Sedona, Arizona. Both projects align with my longstanding storytelling interests: working- and middle-class characters who sometimes go unnoticed in the world and in literature, along with the unexplored corners and unusual geologic landscapes of small-town and urban Arizona, from the heat-baked low-lying Sonoran Desert to a dormant volcano above the treeline at 11,000 feet. As Joan Didion did with California or Kent Haruf with Colorado, I hope to bring my Arizona into focus as more than myth or stereotype, to show the complexities of the place and its people.

I am proud that both Aaron and Bryn teach in UNC Charlotte’s English Department. As creative writing professors, they contribute to the educations of countless students. As fiction writers, they contribute tales of the American West to the ever-expanding library of books that make up Storied Charlotte.

Tags: American West books set in the West fiction

Group Word Play

November 22, 2020 by Mark West

We often think of writing as a solitary activity. When we picture a writer at work, we might think of Emily Dickinson composing her poems alone in her garret, or Jo March from Little Women writing her stories in the corner of an attic, or the reclusive J.D. Salinger writing in a secluded house in rural New Hampshire. Although the stereotype of the solitary writer is deeply rooted in our culture, it, like so many stereotypes, does not always match reality. Many writers actually seek out company. They might lug their laptops to Starbucks so that they can write in the presence of others. They might meet regularly at a favorite pub like J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and some of their writer friends did for many years. Or they might take writing classes and workshops together.

Charlotte area writers occasionally ask me about where they can go to meet other writers or to sign up for workshops. I always refer them to Charlotte Lit and the Charlotte Writers’ Club, both of which offer excellent writing classes and workshops. I recently learned, however, about another opportunity for area writers from Nancy Stancill, an author I featured on my Storied Charlotte blog a few weeks ago. Nancy mentioned that she took a helpful writing course from Maureen Ryan Griffin. I knew about Maureen’s poetry books, but I didn’t know about her work as a writing teacher and coach. I did a little research and discovered that Maureen is the author of a writing book titled Spinning Words into Gold: A Hands-On Guide to the Craft of Writing. She also has a business called WordPlay and her own website: https://www.wordplaynow.com/spinning-words-into-gold-guide

I decided to contact Maureen, and that’s when I found out that she is collaborating with the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library to offer a free Zoom workshop titled “How Writing Can Help Us Cope, and Even Thrive—Through the Pandemic and Beyond” on Wednesday, December 2^nd. Well, this prompted me to send her a follow-up email in which I asked her if she could send me a few paragraphs about her approach to helping people with their writing and her ideas about the value of writing in terms of coping with our current pandemic. Here is what she sent to me:

When I decided, twenty plus years ago, to shift from being a poet and writer of personal essays who occasionally taught creative writing classes to one who had a bona fide business as a writing teacher and coach, I named my business WordPlay. My tagline was “Take your dreams seriously – play with them.” I fervently believe that we human beings learn best through play. And I seriously believe that every human being deserves the joy and fulfillment writing has to offer.

While I don’t remember learning how to read (it has always felt to me that I was born knowing, due, no doubt, to the good fortune of having a mother who read to me with great expression and delight and kept me well-stocked in library books—no small feat given the speed at which I devoured them), I have a number of specific memories of struggling to get the beautiful string of words spooling through my brain onto paper without losing their magic. So I guess it’s no wonder that my favorite question, every time I read words that transported me, through their magic, to worlds I loved dwelling in, was “How did the writer of these words do that?” I’ve spent countless hours of my life exploring answers to that question. I brought the knowledge gained paired with my education and experience teaching brilliant children with various learning disabilities to use their strengths to circumvent their weaknesses, to my own writing, and to supporting my students as they wrote. Once I began teaching creative writing to adults, I added a new question: “How can I help my students write better, with more ease, grace, and enjoyment?” The result has been to develop a number of wholistic writing tools and practices to support an array of learning styles, preferences, and temperaments. I can’t tell you what a joy it is for me to provide services—from workshops to classes to retreats to one-on-one coaching—that engage participants’ hearts, minds, bodies, and spirits and allow words to flow freely for each of them. We all have different brains, which process information in their own ways. I don’t believe in one size fits all or one writing style or method that is best for everyone.

I also don’t believe I’ve ever led a writing event that hasn’t included laughter. And I’m always grateful for the attendees who share the gifts of vulnerability and tears. Open hearts write best. And it’s an opportunity to share a bit of the wisdom of poet Robert Frost: “No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.” My experience of sharing the writing tools I’ve learned, adapted, and created is that, like screwdrivers, wrenches, hammers, and pliers, they have vast utilitarian power. I’ve received dozens upon dozens of thank you notes from students, sometimes years after working with them, saying what a difference the tools have made.

Along with my delight in wordplay, in the sheer fun that writing often is for me, I have always been drawn to the power words have to heal us, to allow us to craft our own beliefs and shape our own destinies. I believe I first learned that language could do this for us in high school, as I read Viktor E. Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning and encountered these words: “The last of the human freedoms: to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. And there were always choices to make. Every day, every hour, offered the opportunity to make a decision, a decision which determined whether you would or would not submit to those powers which threatened to rob you of your very self, your inner freedom; which determined whether or not you become the plaything to circumstance, renouncing freedom and dignity…”

I cannot tell you how much these words move and inspire me each time I read them. You’ve asked me to speak to the value of writing in terms of coping with our current pandemic. It comes down to this: Writing provides release when we are sad, stressed, scared. It allows us different, often larger perspectives on our situation. Writing allows us to name and claim the good in our lives “in any given set of circumstances,” as well as the opportunities and benefits available. Writing enables us to shape our experience into a story, and to deliberately choose this story’s power, value, and meaning, however grim our circumstances may be.

For anyone who is interested in taking Maureen’s upcoming workshop, here is the registration information:

“How Writing Can Help Us Cope, and Even Thrive – Through the Pandemic and Beyond.”

Grief, pain, and loss are a part of each of our lives, especially in this time of Covid-19. What healing benefits can writing provide – physically, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually? Are some writing strategies more helpful than others? In this introduction to Dr. James Pennebaker’s ground-breaking work, you’ll learn three concrete methods of using writing as a transformational tool. And, if you’re interested, you may find the genesis of new poetry, creative nonfiction, and/or fiction. Warning: Laughter likely. Inspiration guaranteed.

WHERE: Via Zoom, in the comfort of your own space
WHEN: Wednesday, December 2^nd, 6:30 – 8 p.m.
COST: Free
TO REGISTER: Register through the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County here.

For area writers, Maureen’s upcoming workshop, like the writing workshops and classes offered by Charlotte Lit and the Charlotte Writers’ Club, can provide encouragement and helpful advice. Just as important, however, is the sense of community that the participants in such workshops and classes often experience. After all, Storied Charlotte is not just about stories—it’s also about a community of readers and writers.

Tags: writing coach writing teacher writing workshop

A Black Girl Magic Book

November 16, 2020 by Mark West

During the nearly eight years that I served as the Chair of UNC Charlotte’s English Department, I got to know the other department chairs since we attended so many meetings together. That is how I got to know Julia Jordan-Zachery, the current chair of the Department of Africana Studies. She came to Charlotte in 2018 after serving as the Director of Black Studies Program at Providence College for ten years. I remember when I first met Julia, we talked about her daughter and the experience of raising children in Charlotte.

Since then Julia has published a new book titled Black Girl Magic Beyond the Hashtag. I recently contacted Julia about this book, and she informed me that the book is tied to conversations she had with her daughter. Intrigued, I asked her if she could send me more information about the book. Here is what she sent to me:

Black Girl Magic Beyond the Hashtag is a work that was birthed as a result of conversations with my daughter. She pushed me to rethink my understandings of Black women’s activism and processes of self-articulation. A bit of this is captured in the final chapter which is a conversation we had on #BlackGirlMagic. It’s important to understand the wellspring of this work as it speaks to the core of what this book is about—Black women in relation. Black Girl Magic Beyond the Hashtag is about Black women in relation to structures, to each other, and themselves. In the book we analyze how Black femmes, girls and women do the work, the real hard work, of making themselves real in a society that often makes them invisible.

We argue that the work of making themselves real is captured in four elements: 1. Community Building; 2. Challenging dehumanizing representations vis-à-vis self-representation; 3. Engaging in a project of visibility; 4. Restoring what is sometimes violently taken. These four elements afford Black femmes, girls, and women the opportunity to engage in a practice, invoking #BlackGirlMagic, to make whole from fragments (that result from race-gender oppressive structures), exist in a space that is neither sacred nor secular, and deploy speculative freedom. Black Girl Magic becomes a rallying cry that cuts across age and location.

As we experience COVID-19, anti-Blackness and an economic down turn, we see elements of the essence of Black Girl Magic in the streets of Charlotte. The murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor alongside the gun violence in Charlotte gives us an opportunity to see how Black women do the work of making themselves real. I think of two organizations that embody the basic premise of the work—Sanctuary in the City and Mothers of Murdered Offspring. The mission of Sanctuary in the City reads, “Sanctuary in the City is a black led, woman led organization founded with the awareness of the need for accessible, safe, and affirming healing spaces for Black Indigenous people of color”. Mothers of Murdered Offspring was co-founded by, Dee Sumpter in 1983 after the murder of her daughter. These two organizations are doing the work that we describe in Black Girl Magic Beyond the Hashtag. They embody the four elements that we describe by articulating a positionality for Black women to enter into when the world seeks to erase them.

For readers who are interested in learning more about Black Girl Magic Beyond the Hashtag, the publisher (University of Arizona Press) has additional information on its website: https://uapress.arizona.edu/book/black-girl-magic-beyond-the-hashtag

When I asked Julia if she could send me a statement about her book, I was not sure she would be able to take the time to write something for me. As a former department chair, I know that Julia is swamped with the many challenges of running a department during these difficult times. Needless to say, I am grateful that she took the time out of her busy schedule to share her reflections on Black Girl Magic with Storied Charlotte.

Christmas Stories by Charlotte Writers

November 09, 2020 by Mark West

There is only one movie that I watch at least once every year and that is A Christmas Story, the 1983 comedy based on Jean Shepherd’s book In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash. For me, Christmas would not be Christmas without revisiting Ralphie and the other members of the Parker family. My favorite character is the father, generally known as the Old Man. In some ways, this character reminds me of my own father. Like Mr. Parker, my father sometimes seemed a bit on the gruff side, and he could easily match Mr. Parker in the swearing department. However, he and Mr. Parker both understood the importance of honoring family holiday traditions.

My father came from a long line of Polish Jews, so he did not grow up celebrating Christmas. My mother, however, came from an equally long line of Swedish Lutherans who always celebrated Christmas. For my mother, Christmas presented an opportunity to celebrate her Swedish heritage. My brother, sister, and I wholeheartedly joined in the Swedish merriment. We baked Swedish Christmas cookies, listened to Swedish Christmas music, and put Swedish decorations on our fourteen-foot Christmas tree. My father half-heartedly went along with our Swedish Christmas doings, but he must have felt a bit like the odd man out. Eventually, however, he found a way to make his own contribution to our family’s Christmas traditions.

Throughout my childhood, my father read aloud to us kids every night after we finished our homework. We had no television, so listening to Dad read was our main form of evening entertainment. One of my father’s favorite authors was Charles Dickens, and he read to us a number of Dickens’s novels. One Christmas Eve, he took Dickens’s A Christmas Carol off the shelf and read it to us. Usually Mom didn’t listen to Dad read aloud, but that night she joined us in the living room. The reading of A Christmas Carol became an annual ritual. Ever since then, I have taken an interest in Christmas stories. Thus, I am pleased to report the recent publication of several appealing and diverse Christmas stories by Charlotte writers.

Darin Kennedy, a Charlotte physician and author of a half-dozen fantasy novels, has just released a young-adult novel titled Carol. This novel has many connections to Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, but Darin takes the story in a new direction. I recently contacted Darin and asked him for more information about Carol. Here is what he sent to me:

Carol is the product of a seed of an idea that woke me from a dead sleep a few years ago, much like one of the Spirits of Christmas Past, Present, or Future. “A young adult version of A Christmas Carol!” I believe were my exact words before I’d fully even woken up. This book has been finished for years but, though near and dear to my heart, never found a publishing home. Then, 2020 happened and this story called out to me and said, “This is the year. Just make it happen.” With awesome editing and layout by the incomparable Melissa McArthur and a gorgeous cover from the extremely talented Natania Barron, I self-published my version of the Dickens’s classic under my own imprint, 64Square Publishing and it’s now available just in time for the holiday season.

Carol is the story of Carol Davis, a “mean girl” if there ever was one, who is surprisingly bitter for a seventeen-year-old who is about to come into a lot of money for reasons the book makes clear. Sharp-tongued and self-centered, she looks out for number one, and steps over or on anyone who gets in her way, be it her best friend, a boy she’s known forever, or the aunt and uncle who took her in after a family tragedy. Visited by the ghost of her mentor in the ways of ruling the school on the anniversary of her December drowning, Carol learns that a horrible fate awaits her on Christmas Eve if she doesn’t turn her life around in the three days left before Christmas Day. Each night, a Spirit of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come appear to help Carol find her way, but as her life spirals further and further out of control, one fateful decision will determine whether or not she’s too far gone to save from her terrible destiny.

Landis Wade, a former trial lawyer and founder and host of Charlotte Readers Podcast, is also the author of The Christmas Courtroom Trilogy. The third and most recent book in this trilogy is The Christmas Redemption. I contacted Wade and asked him for more information about A Christmas Redemption. Here is what he sent to me:

I have always loved Christmas, so when I decided to write the first book in The Christmas Courtroom Trilogy as a gift to my family, I combined my love of the secular holiday with my experience as a trial lawyer to find out what would happen if belief in Santa Claus was put on trial in the modern day. In each of the three books, the final verdict in the courtroom and for the characters is at the heart of the story, but I also had fun imposing modern day challenges for Santa’s enterprise outside the courtroom. The “what if” in book one relates to problems imposed by keeping the naughty and nice list on a stolen flash drive, the “what if” in book two relates to problems associated with an experimental but defective delivery system and the “what if” in book three–The Christmas Redemption–explores what could happen to the North Pole and the future of Christmas when there is an international conspiracy affecting the environment.

All the books have a light, humorous side to the courtroom action, because it’s not every day that a verdict depends on belief in Santa Claus. That’s why my favorite review is the one that calls my books a cross between My Cousin Vinny and Miracle on 34th Street. And in The Christmas Redemption, I take the courtroom fight to three venues, a class action civil lawsuit over the most popular Christmas present in 50 years, a federal criminal courtroom and a trial before the Elf High Council. I also reveal the true character of the evil-doer, the little man with eyes as black as coal who sought in books one and two to undermine the lawyers who wanted to save Christmas.

They say a good trial lawyer never asks a witness a question if the lawyer doesn’t know how the witness will answer it, but for the writer in me, that was half the fun, putting witnesses on the courtroom witness stand and being surprised at the answers they gave. In the end, I became a True Believer all over again.

Gail Z. Martin and Nancy Northcott are both prolific Charlotte writers, and both of them have stories in Christmas at Caynham Castle, a collection of seven romance novellas connected by a holiday ball. Set in an ancient castle in a charming old town on the Welsh border, they’re laced with adventure, history, mystery, and ghosts, as well as romance. I contacted Gail and Nancy and asked them for more information about their contributions to this anthology.

Here is what Gail sent to me:

Crewel Fate was inspired by the many embroidery samples I’ve seen when touring historic homes. When Teag Logan and his fiancé Anthony Benton travel to England to celebrate their engagement, Teag’s magic and supernatural experience hone in on restless ghosts, an old scandal and century-old secrets that could turn deadly. Can Teag and Anthony solve the mystery and settle the ghosts before the Ball, or will more people join the ranks of the castle ghosts? Crewel Fate is part of my Deadly Curiosities urban fantasy series, and falls immediately after the newest novel, Inheritance.

Here is what Nancy sent to me:

The Last Favor, part of my Arachnid Files spy series, was inspired by my experiences and those of friends in dealing with loss at the holidays. Grayson Kane, the hero, comes to Caynham Castle to pick up an award for his late father. Dealing with his loss amid the families celebrating the holiday makes him question his solitary life as a covert agent. His partner, Laurel Whitney, joins him to protect Gray from an assassin. As the long-suppressed attraction between them flares anew and a killer closes in, she must decide whether she has the courage to seize what she has always wanted.

James (Jim) Nettles, who writes under the pen name of James P. McDonald, is a founding partner of Author Essentials, a Charlotte-based firm that provides marketing and other professional services geared to writers. He is also the author of numerous science fiction and fantasy books. He recently published a young adult fantasy novel titled The Krampus Clause. In this novel,he draws on the central European folklore about Krampus, a demon-like character who is sometimes seen as Saint Nicolas’s arch nemesis. I recently contacted Jim and asked him for more information about The Krampus Clause. Here is what he sent to me:

Ten-year-old Gabriella’s brother is a jerk, and his best friend and their neighbor is worse, Daddy just brought home a Nancy in the Nook doll that’s even creepier than her partner Ned, and all she wants is to protect her back-yard domain and survive gymnastics. Now, Grandmother is visiting from her Austrian village to visit for the holidays, bringing heirloom decorations, her famous stöllen recipe, and a family legacy. When her grandmother gives her a special gift, will she use it to save her brother, or follow an ancient power in a red suit?

Inspired by Victorian ghost stories in the spirit of A Christmas Carol and dark but fun holiday traditions like The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, The Krampus Clause is a fun young adult holiday horror to be read around the Yule Log as the days grow short, the nights grow cold, and the elves come to see how naughty you’ve really been.

The aforementioned Christmas stories both honor and deviate from the traditions and expectations that we associate with Christmas, and that is as it should be. In the conclusion of A Christmas Story, the Parker family is unable to have their traditional turkey dinner on Christmas since their neighbors’ dogs ate the turkey. However, the Parkers make some adjustments, and have their Christmas dinner at a Chinese restaurant instead. During this holiday season, many of us will have to make adjustments to our holiday plans on account of the current pandemic. We might not be able to share a dinner together with all of our relatives, but we can still share stories. Charlotte’s writers are serving some great new Christmas stories for everyone to enjoy as we celebrate the holiday season here in Storied Charlotte.

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