Marvelously funny, bittersweet, and beautifully evocative, the original publication of A Short History of a Small Place announced the arrival of one of our great Southern voices. Although T. R. Pearson's Neely, North Carolina, doesn't appear on any map of the state, it has already earned a secure place on the literary landscape of the South. In this introduction to Neely, the young narrator, Louis Benfield, recounts the tragic last days of Miss Myra Angelique Pettigrew, a local spinster and former town belle who, after years of total seclusion, returns flamboyantly to public view-with her pet monkey, Mr. Britches. Here is a teeming human comedy inhabited by some of the most eccentric and endearing characters ever encountered in literature.

Marvelously funny, bittersweet, and beautifully evocative, the original publication of "A Short History of a Small Place" announces the arrival of one of the great Southern voices.

"An absolute stunner . . . In a small place in North Carolina, Pearson has found the stuff of life." (The Washington Post Book World)

"Anyone from anywhere should feel a fond familiarity with the citizens of Neely." (The New York Times Book Review)