Flann's Fan

While it's fairly well known that Flannery O'Connor has influenced a number of contemporary cultural icons (e.g. Bruce Springsteen, Conan O'Brien, Tommy Lee Jones), she has also inspired some notable modern writers. Starting today, I'd like to focus on a few of these authors.  The first is Heather King, a non-fiction writer I was introduced to this year.  In her own words, Heather is "an ex-barfly, ex-lawyer, Catholic convert with three memoirs: Parched (the dark years); Redeemed (crawling toward the light); and Shirt of Flame (my year of wandering around Koreatown, L.A. 'with' St. Therese of Lisieux, a cloistered 19th-c. French nun). I write, I speak, I teach, I explore the confluence of creativity and transcendence; the sacred and the profane; the weird, the wonderful, and the wacky."  With a writer who is drawn to the "confluence of creativity and transcendence" is it any wonder then that she counts Flannery O'Connor as her literary muse?  There are others, but if you go to Heather's blog you will see that Flannery tops the list of her "patron saints."  Like O'Connor, Heather King has a wonderful sense of humor combined with a depth of spiritual understanding.  She is a splendid writer whose books I cannot recommend highly enough.
- Mark