Ezra Ballinger, protagonist of The Cowboy Church, would appreciate me keepin’ this short. So I will.

J.L. Mackey is an author, poaster, and all around DisLit staple. He’s hilarious, to-the-point, and embodies the criteria for a new, based kind of Southern Gothic, something we attempt to define on the pod.

His cinematic latest novella The Cowboy Church tracks Ballinger, a simple bar owner beset by chronic and crushing arthritis, as he faces off against a private equity type mogul.

I’d highly recommend the read. Like most DisLit standouts (Automaton by The Writings of T.R. Hudson and Nutcrankr by Baltic State come to mind), The Cowboy Church isn’t a political work. It’s based only in that it seeks its own beauty, meaning, and truth outside the pollution of ideology.

J.L. Mackey on Twitter

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