Tara asked David Joy:

I enjoy your recommendations on Goodreads as well as in interviews, etc. I recently read Angels Burning by Tawni O'Dell and loved it, and her style. Can you recommend any other female authors orbiting in this sphere? I find much Southern female-written fiction borders on being a beach-read (whimsical low country romance, which has it's place), but would love to find more like Tawni.

David Joy The two that immediately come to mind are Steph Post and Bonnie Jo Campbell. Steph's got two novels out, A Tree Born Crooked and Lightwood, with another hitting shelves in January called Walk In The Fire. I think Lightwood was one of the best novels to come out this year, and Walk In The Fire is just as good. She's gritty and raw and has tremendous control over a story. Bonnie Jo's American Salvage is a story collection, and while it's not set in the South (set in Michigan), she writes about rural, working class people about as wonderfully as any writer I know. I loved all of these stories and I loved her collection Mothers, Tell Your Daughters as well. She's amazingly talented.

As far as other female writers I love, I think Megan Abbott is one of the most talented writers at work right now, period. I've loved every book I've picked up from her. I really love Crystal Wilkinson. Her latest novel Birds Of Opulence was absolutely beautiful. I loved Carrie Mullins' Night Garden. I just read a novel by a writer named Tess Sharpe called Barbed Wire Heart and she reminds me a lot of Steph Post and Bonnie Jo, so I think you'd dig that novel. That's a pretty good list, but if you work through that stack of books let me know and I'll be happy to send along some more.

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