Editors of Garden and Gun

This is a book on “Innovators, Artists, and Icons” of Southern Women? Oh, please. Then where is Alice Walton, founder of Crystal Bridges? What happened to Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, the creator and writer of “Designing Women”? And who chose to omit Roseanne Cash, whose musical legacy far surpasses that of Lucinda Williams and can sing without sounding as if she’s gargling rocks?

These are only three unforgivable “oversights” in this quirky, overpriced production that isn’t even heavy enough to use as a doorstop. I am embarrassed to see the paltry list of writers included in this book—it’s a miracle that Eudora and Flannery made the cut into this aleatoric collection of almost unrelated nonsense.

Perhaps a section on Fictional Characters would have improved the book somewhat, or at least livened it up a bit. As it stands, Southern Women is one of the most over-hyped, over promised, and underwhelming books to be published in the 21st century, and Garden & Gun owes its women readers both an apology and a far better effort.

I do not recommend this book, after anticipating its publication for months. It could have been so good.… (meer)