Lots of Carolinas titles up for SIBA awards

Carolinas authors and publishing houses are well represented among finalists for this year's Southern Independent Book Awards, given by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance.

In the fiction category alone, there's Anna Jean Mayhew's "The Dry Grass of August." She grew up in Charlotte. Also on the list are Davidson College graduate John Hart's "Iron House" and Charles Frazier's "Nightwoods." Frazier lives near Raleigh.

Two Charlotte authors are also finalists in the young adult category: Carrie Ryan for "The Dark and Hollow Places" and A.J. Hartley for "Darwen Arkwright and the Peregrine Pact."

Nonfiction nominees include Robert Morgan's "Lions of the West" and Celia Rivenbark's "You Don't Sweat Much for a Fat Girl." Morgan, who teaches at Cornell University, grew up in North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains. Rivenbark lives in Wilmington.

Morgan' "Terroir" is also a nominee in the poetry category. So is Ron Rash's "Waking." Rash, who grew up in Boiling Springs, teaches at Western Carolina University.

Check out the whole list here. Winners will be announced on July 4 -- Independence Day. (Also, Independents' Day. Get it?)