Hi Wes,
   I can give you the name of an expert on Southern women writers  - Dr.
Mary
Ann Wilson, University of Louisiana at Lafayette.  Dr. Wilson taught an
excellent course at the Elmira College Center for Mark Twain Studies on MT
and Southern women writers, some of these included Jean Stafford & The
Mountain Lion, and Kaye Gibbons',  Ellen Foster.
  Hey, with MT, it's hard to get "off topic."
  Cheers!
  Gretchen Sharlow