State of the Heart

State of the Heart

South Carolina Writers on the Places They Love

  • Author: Rogers, Aïda; Finney, Nikky; King Conroy, Cassandra
  • Publisher: University of South Carolina Press
  • ISBN: 9781611179033
  • eISBN Pdf: 9781611179040
  • eISBN Epub: 9781611179040
  • Place of publication:  South Carolina , United States
  • Year of digital publication: 2018
  • Month: August
  • Language: English

A heartfelt collection of personal stories that connect a common past and offer hope for a promising future

For many, South Carolina is a sunny vacation destination. For those who have been lucky enough to call it home, it is a source of rich memories and cultural heritage. In this final volume of State of the Heart, thirty-eight nationally and regionally known writers share their personal stories about places in South Carolina that hold special meaning for them. While this is a book about place, it is ultimately about people's connections to one another, to a complex, common past, and to ongoing efforts to build a future of promise and possibility in the Palmetto state.

Editor Aïda Rogers groups the essays thematically, with poetry, vintage photographs, and even recipes introducing each section. She unites pieces by New York Times best-selling novelists Patti Callahan Henry, CJ Lyons, and John Jakes; USA Today best-selling mystery writer Susan Boyer; historians Walter Edgar, Orville Vernon Burton, and Bernard Powers; artist and author Mary Whyte; and cookbook authors Sallie Ann Robinson and the Lee Brothers—just to name a few.

Nikky Finney, a South Carolina native and winner of the 2011 National Book Award for poetry, provides the foreword. The afterword is written by Cassandra King, author of six novels, including the New York Times best seller The Sunday Wife.

  • Cover
  • STATE OF THE HEART
  • Title
  • Copyright
  • CONTENTS
  • List of Illustrations
  • Foreword: Heart Height and Weight
  • Acknowledgments
  • Introduction: Custom-Made
  • Morning
    • A Scrap of Heaven
  • Town People
    • The Rent We Pay for Living
    • A Tale of Two Towns
    • Mystery and Contradiction: My Story of Ninety Six
    • In Search of Peanut Butter Pie
  • The More We Play Together
    • Getting Schooled
    • We Were Journalists Once. And Young
  • Charleston
    • My Charleston Is a Movie Set
    • Safe Keeping
    • The Precipice of the World
  • Better Homes and Gardens
    • Better than the Real Thing
    • A Garden Is for Re-creation
  • Children, Water
    • Once More to Campbell’s Pond
    • Black Water River
    • Summers on Stevens Creek
    • Swept in with Her Tide
  • Land Rich
    • Deep Country
    • Sometimes You Just Get Lucky
    • My Wild Life in Cedar Creek
  • Island People
    • An Enchantment of Light
    • Sweet Home Daufuskie
    • A Lesson from Ole Jones
    • This Isn’t a Golf Hole
    • The Best Days of Our Lives
  • Ocean Drive
    • This Magic Moment
    • Zen Surfer
  • Still Standing
    • Hotel Resilience
    • A Nineteenth-Century Poet’s Garden Bower
    • “More than a House”
  • Questing
    • Lick Log Falls
    • Peaceful Places
    • A Little Something to Take the Edge Off
    • The Magic of Mepkin
  • Morning, Reprise
    • Heaven
  • Afterword: The Same, yet Different
  • Contributors

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