[close] The chignoned, post-menopausal author of Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady has given us a feast--an anthology of her fiction and non-fiction written over the past 20 years. King has us dancing with joy as she turns her keen eye and uncivil tongue on sisterhood, the sexes and sex (she's against it these days), politics, and most particularly the South that hatched her. Ms. King is simply what many strive to be and few achieve--a true American original. She's unafraid, unabashed and unleashed from worrying about what anyone else might think. [close]