ARTHUR BYRD
A Southern Fiction Novelist
Perspective
Literary fiction feeds the soul. Human bonds, man's relationship to nature, and travels into the wilderness of the human consciousness frame the experiences of ordinary life for writers detailing what it means to be alive.
My first novel published in 2017, What the River Wants, follows a Mississippi family struggling to piece itself together after loss and separation. A grandfather withdraws to a river bank to grapple the vagaries of creeping time and grief. A teenage grandson explores young adulthood as a school genealogy project binds him to his grandfather. Family stories awaken the boy to a family lineage revealing hints of his own capabilities. And a middle-aged daughter studies the faltering marriage filling her with doubts as she questions her own life. A story of friendship and love, treachery and loss, these characters of Southern fiction live ordinary lives awakened by the potency of human connection. The River was awarded an Honorable Mention in the 2017 Great Southeastern Book Festival.
Crossing Lake Pontchartrain, my second novel published July 2023, follows a 40-year-old Mississippi man's journey beyond his mid-life mess and imminent divorce. But after he meets a beautiful Argentine painter and a new job takes him to post-Katrina New Orleans, artsy, worldly strangers inspire him not only to revive his writing dream but to find the life he’s denied himself. A portrait of the artist as an everyman, Larry’s search explores the borderline between human bonding and the workings of the creative process. This novel received a “Distinguished Favorite” award in the 2023 NYC Big Book Awards.
Here's an excerpt from a Reader's Favorite 5-star review:
“Fantastic... Even after I finished the novel, I kept returning to it. . .a sense of mystery and intrigue that makes it addictive. . .Crossing Lake Pontchartrain is a deeply gripping narrative. . . family, Eastern philosophy, psychology, and art . . . will inspire you.”