Smokestack Lightning

The book Smokestack Lightning is about barbecue and the gnarled fingers of elderly black men smoking cow heads and brisket in hand-dug smoke pits in the yards behind abandoned gas stations in the South. More than that of course... It is not a cookbook it's as much about the American Dream as Fear & Loathing was. The concepts are surprisingly vast in a biopic that's more often a comic foil in the middle of a morning tv show. Lolis Eric Elie makes it all artful, tangible and powerful. It courts the real for the greater sense of palpation.

"Truth being what it is-vast and yet surprisingly deceptive-what you will retain will be the tale's edited version, it's essence. And as you choose to remember then, both tale and teller, Charlie mac will become more than a historian of a small village in Georgia. He will become the griot of this whole thing-its Homer if you will."
-Lolis Eric Elie

There's a great interview with the author here. I also hear his book cornbread nation is excellent but I've not read it yet. Lolis Eric Elie is a columnist and food writer for the New Orleans Times-Picayune.