In a Southern Cultures essay published in 2000, Jerry Leath Mills came up with a “single, simple, litmus-like test [to gauge] the quality of southerness in literature . . . Is there a dead mule in it?” We were curious if Mills’s hypothesis held up, so we brought the question to some of our favorite authors. Join Jill McCorkle, Megan Mayhew Bergman, Jamie Quatro, and others as they continue the conversation started in our pages. Toast that talk and the new 21c Fiction Issue with the Deader Mule, a special cocktail from 21C Museum Hotel.
This issue launch in downtown Durham–one of several events planned for the month of October to honor southern writers and stories, past and present–is free and open to the public.