From Tickfaw to Shongaloo

From Tickfaw to Shongaloo is a comic Southern tale told in the first person by Raylene, a local gossip in little Stokely, Louisiana. Bert Dilly the postmaster (we learn), has been spreading town gossip (like everyone else), fueled by his habit of being a little too involved with the local mail (opened or not). A disgruntled maiden lady writes a scathing letter of complaint, which is reported to the state postmaster, and Bert's brother, J.T., accuses Bert of mental incompetence (he wants the family land). Bert is replaced until the charges can be taken up by a federal court in Baton Rouge.Most of the town rallies around Bert, but the hearing devolves into a kangaroo court, turning citizens against each other, egged on by a crooked lawyer who crumbles when the whole matter blows up in his face, through his own arrogance and ignorance of certain facts (crazy as they were). After three days of ridiculous testimony and unreliable evidence, the judge must make his landmark decision about Bert, the mail, and gossip in Stokeley, Louisiana—where the townsfolk can hardly wait to exchange their own versions of the honest truth.

DIXON HEARNE is the author of four books of fiction and editor of several anthologies. From Tickfaw to Shongaloo was the sole Runner-Up in the 2014 Faulkner Wisdom Novella Competition. Plantatia: High-toned and Low-down Stories of the South was nominated for the Hemingway/PEN award, and his stories have been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Other work has appeared in Collier's magazine, Oxford American, Louisiana Literature, Big Muddy, Tulane Review, and elsewhere. Much of his work is drawn from the rich images of daily life along the river traces and delta flats of Louisiana.