The Star-Herald
KOSCIUSKO —
Former Kosciusko resident Stokes McMillan has once again been honored for his first book by the Mississippi Library Association.
McMillan was the 2012 winner for non-fiction in the Mississippi Author Awards for “One Night of Madness.”
The book chronicles the murders of the Harris family, a black family, at the hands of Leon Turner and the Whitt brothers, who were white, in late 1949/early 1950 in the Newport area of Attala County.
Photographs captured by his father Billy McMillan for The Star-Herald in 1949-1950 led McMillan to write the story.
“Needless to say, I am greatly surprised by this honor,” McMillan said.
These awards are held annually, and the winners must be a Mississippian by birth or have lived in Mississippi for at least five consecutive years.
Recipients were honored during the MLA’s conference in Natchez.
Other winners include:
– Ramona Bridges is the 2012 Winner for Fiction for her novel, “Sweet By and By.” She is a native of Mississippi, where she resides with her family. “Sweet By and By” has been described as “amazing” and “uplifting.” A blend of rural Mississippi realness, Scripture, and a bit of romance, “Sweet By and By” is Bridges’ first novel.
– Margaret McMullan is the 2012 Special Award Winner. A native of Newton County, McMullan has written six award-winning books, including “How I Found the Strong,” winner of the 2006 MLA Author Award for Fiction. In 2007, she was the Eudora Welty Visiting Writer at Millsaps College in Jackson. She currently teaches at the University of Evansville, in Evansville, Indiana, where she is Professor and Melvin M. Peterson Endowed Chair in Literature and Writing.
He was the recipient of the 2010 Independent Publisher Book Award gold medal in the South – Best Regional Non-Fiction category for “Madness.”
Former Recipients of these MAA awards are: John Grisham, Kathryn Stockett, Eudora Welty and Willie Morris.
The book can be purchased on www.stokesmcmillan.com
