Stayton Bonner

Click here to read my review of Nacogdoches-based author Joe R. Lansdale's most recent novel Vanilla Ride. Having grown up in East Texas—behind the Pine Curtain, as they say—the Texas Observer has had me cover the region several times. It's interesting to reevaluate the place of my birth after not living there for 15 years. East Texas is beautiful. Black bear and white heron congregate around murky lakes under dense pine forests. The region is also financially poor since the dwindling of oil jobs, leaving plenty of angry rednecks and mean old ladies.

But you can find that anywhere.

East Texas is a strange place. Part Deep South and part Texas. It's kind of hard to pinpoint. Although I don't think his writing is always top-notch, Lansdale captures the region well as a native son. His sci-fi, western, or noir stories are most notable for their sharp and often hilarious dialogue.

Michael Dougan—a Seattle-based cartoonist who had a short-lived MTV series—also nails the Piney Woods in his graphic novel memoir East Texas: Tales From Behind the Pine Curtain. Dougan should do more graphic novels. His work is great.

 The media often portrays East Texas incorrectly. A melting pot of race, the region is more pragmatically egalitarian than conflict-ridden. It's a humid sleepy place where folks work hard, drink beer on Saturday night, (Baptists usually do this behind closed doors,) and then go to church on Sunday morning. I can't say that I'd now choose to live behind the Pine Curtain, but I'm glad to be from there.