Make Yourselves at Home

What lurks beneath the surface of small-town propriety? These stories of small-town life in the American South evoke a pleasant and polite community feeling, and some of them are blessed by strong family ties. But the stories, some comic, some dark, and some both comic and dark, all reveal secrets and resentments that fester in the past and haunt the present. In the tradition set by Southern writers Flannery O’Connor, Carson McCullers, and Eudora Welty, Katherine Elberfeld has invented eccentric characters who range from a little bit odd to downright crazy. Her stories are about choices and changes, and her characters come to terms with what life has given them, making mistakes for the better and sometimes for the worse.