Sugar Land

Name: Sugar Land
Brand: Brilliance Audio
Availability: InStock
Author: Tammy Lynne Stoner
ISBN: 9781978649057

Author: Tammy Lynne Stoner

Narrator: Donna Postel

Unabridged: 11 hr 34 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Brilliance Audio

Published: 11/20/2018

Categories: Fiction, Southern, Lgbtq+, Literary Fiction

Synopsis

Sugar Land is a southern fried novel about love, Lead Belly, and liberation. According to a starred Kirkus Review, Sugar Land "is a postcard of small-town Texas life from Prohibition through civil rights, tracing the treatment and awareness of gay people through these decades. The love child of Fannie Flagg and Rita Mae Brown… [a] ravishing debut.” It’s 1923 in Midland, Texas, and Miss Dara falls in love with her best friend―who also happens to be a girl. Terrified, Miss Dara takes a job at the Imperial State Prison Farm for men. Once there, she befriends inmate and soon-to-be legendary blues singer Lead Belly, who sings his way out (true story)―but only after he makes her promise to free herself from her own prison. Sugar Land is a triumphant, beautiful novel about the heart’s refusal to be denied what the heart wants.

About Tammy Lynne Stoner

Tammy Lynne Stoner’s work has been selected for more than a dozen anthologies and literary journals. She was nominated for a Million Writers Award and earned her MFA from Antioch University. Stemming from what her grandmother calls her “gypsy blood,” Tammy has lived in 15 cities, working as a biscuit maker, a medical experimentee, a forklift operator, a gas station attendant, and a college instructor, among other odd jobs. She is the creator of Dottie’s Magic Pockets and the publisher of Gertrude Press, based in in Portland, OR, where she lives with her lady-friend, Karena, and their three kids.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jennifer ~ TarHeelReader on May 01, 2019

Sugar Land has received a starred review from Kirkus, and I can definitely understand why. I instantly fell right into Miss Dara’s story and Stoner’s storytelling. ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ In 1920s Texas, Miss Dara has fallen in love with her best friend. This terrifies her, so she seeks a job at the Imperial S......more

Goodreads review by Lark on October 19, 2019

Early in this novel the teen-aged Dara kisses the first great love of her life, Rhodie, and in a burst of insight and joy she realizes she is a lesbian. The very next day Dara overhears her uncle, the town sheriff, laughing with another officer about how the two of them had cured four women of their......more

Goodreads review by LauraBeth on January 21, 2019

I've seen this compared to Fannie Flagg and while the mood is a bit darker, there are similar themes of strong female characters and unspoken secrets against the backdrop of a small southern town that's resistant to change. More than Flagg, this book reminded me of Springsteen's Nebraska album. Acou......more

Goodreads review by Colleen on November 15, 2018

Full disclosure - the author is a very dear childhood friend. Being a supporter of friends and all things women entrepreneur, I bought the book and read it to be supportive. And I LOVED it. No, really...I absolutely loved it. If I didn't love it, I would never take the time to write a review. I sit......more

Goodreads review by SUSAN *Nevertheless,she persisted* on December 09, 2018

Loved this book. Would recommend.......more