Marianne Leek went to interview 87-year-old David Burch in North Carolina. She thought it would last an hour. But it lasted all day. And she learned a lot of lessons about hope.

All of us at Salvation South look forward to spending our first full year with you in 2022.

Beloved newswoman Kay Powell tells us how her mama’s pimento cheese wound up being the subject of a sociology class in Colorado. (Recipe included.)

Compelled by a family tragedy, Frankie Roberts started LINC to provide hope, skills and community for men and women coming out of prison and addiction.

The Appalachian mountains are full of women who “become everybody’s mother.” This poem from Marianne Leek pays Christmas homage to one of them.

To get through times like these, we’ve got to build our own little houses of hope and then live in them.

Erik Peters brings us a small piece of fiction about a small gesture — and how such gestures can mean so much.

Their mother was honest with her children. If only her children hadn’t been honest with their classmates.

Our editor ponders whether we can create a new recipe for a happy Christmas.

Or, How the Pandemic Kicked My Kitchen Perfectionism to the Curb

Sarah Brown knows exactly what’s right and exactly what’s wrong in the making of pimento cheese, specifically the sort that will send a shiver down your spine.

Will Wellman brings us four poems from his heart — and from his native home of Florida.