by Sarah Loudin Thomas | Jul 4, 2022 | Appalachian, holidays, West Virginia
Happy Fourth of July from this red, white, and blue West Virginia writer to YOU! If you didn’t already know, my home state’s motto is: Mountaineers are always free. There’s a serious thread of independence running through the mountains I call home. And what...
by Sarah Loudin Thomas | Apr 4, 2022 | Giving Thanks, West Virginia
I met two West Virginians this past week right here in Lenoir, NC. We DIDN’T burst into “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” but in one situation we had an in-depth discussion of pepperoni rolls and in the second we talked about how Mountaineers have an...
by Sarah Loudin Thomas | Mar 14, 2022 | Appalachian, History, West Virginia, Writing
How do you write a satisfying story about a real event that simply does NOT have a happy ending? That’s what I tackled when I decided to write The Finder of Forgotten Things around the Hawks Nest Tunnel Disaster. I’ve long been haunted by tunnel...
by Sarah Loudin Thomas | Jan 24, 2022 | Friends, Reading, West Virginia
I recently got an email from Judi, a reader in Delaware who sent a copy of The Finder of Forgotten Things to her father since he’d married a woman from WV and spends half his year there. They all enjoyed the story so much, she ended up sending copies to five...
by Sarah Loudin Thomas | Oct 21, 2021 | Appalachian, Family, Language, West Virginia
Today’s post is a continuation from last week. Sharing more delightful tidbits of our Appalachian way of speaking! NOT AS WRONG AS YOU THINK – Appalachian dialect can be labeled uneducated or backwards. Maybe folks need to rethink that one . . ....