The Unnatural History of Cypress Parish

Elise Blackwell has a new novel out this month, The Unnatural History of Cypress Parish. It's an elegant, economically written 200-pager that takes place in southern Louisiana on the eve of Hurricane Katrina and in the memory of the main character, 90-year-old Louis Proby, who recalls how his life was ruined by another great flood in 1927.

A true Southerner (in the sense that she grew up in southern Louisiana and teaches at South Carolina), Blackwell is well equipped to tell this very compelling tale, which has earned quite a bit of national praise already. We hope to cover this book more on the site in the near future. For now, here are some links:

Read my 2003 interview with Elise Blackwell about her previous novel, Hunger.

Read an excerpt from The Unnatural History of Cypress Parish.

Purchase The Unnatural History of Cypress Parish at Powell's.