I first heard about Joshilyn Jackson while doing a book tour down South several years ago. I kept seeing her books and hearing her name everywhere, so before getting on a plane back to San Francisco, I bought a copy of gods in Alabama. It takes a very long time to get from Alabama to San Francisco. By the time my plane landed at SFO, Joshilyn Jackson had a new fan. Then I started reading her blog, which is as warm and darkly funny as her books.
Jackson’s latest novel, The Girl Who Stopped Swimming, is a contemporary ghost story set in the Scissorhands-esqe suburb of Victorianna, Florida. In the opening chapter, a quilt maker named Laurel is awakened by the ghost of a dead girl. After that, I dare you to put the novel down before you’re finished.

So much of this book feels familiar to me: the surreal suburb of Victorianna, as well as its counterpart, the poverty-stricken town of DeLop, where Laurel’s mother grew up. In the trailer parks of DeLop, abject poverty reigns, and to be a stranger is to be suspect. The Victorianna/DeLop dichotomy struck a cord with me. From the age of thirteen onward, I grew up in Mobile, Alabama, which is perhaps the epitome of the suburban South–endless strip malls, snarled traffic, big cars and gargantuan churches as far as the eye can see. But I spent enough time in rural Mississippi to be aware of an entirely different kind of South–not quite so downtrodden as DeLop, but perhaps more in keeping with the general notion of the South held by many who’ve never been there, and some who have. DeLop is a closed society, a place as difficult to escape as it is to penetrate.

I flat-out loved this book. For a chance to win a signed copy, just go to my SF Chronicle blog and leave a comment before midnight on Wedensday, May 27. The winner will be randomly selected. U.S. and Canada addresses only, please.

Visit my website, follow me on twitter, or join me and my friend Meg Waite Clayton this Thursday at Mrs. Dalloway’s in Berkeley (7:30 p.m.), where Meg will be reading from The Wednesday Sisters and I’ll be reading from No One You Know.