Collected Works of Flannery O'Connor

Book review from The Movie Snob

Collected Works, by Flannery O'Connor (Library of America 1988). I have been meaning to try O'Connor's work for a long time, given her sterling reputation as a Southern and Catholic author. So I picked up this convenient volume of her works and dove in. So far I'm through the short novel Wise Blood and the short-story collection A Good Man Is Hard to Find, I have enjoyed them a lot. The characters are vividly drawn, and many of the stories feature shocking twists or acts of violence that still pack a punch in this jaded age some 50 years on. Christianity often has a prominent role in these stories, and O'Connor's characters--mostly ordinary Southern folk--usually have a devil of a time grappling with it. I'm sure this stuff would not be everyone's cup of tea, but you should give it a try sometime and see what you think.