Sunbelt Gothic

 Billie Louise Jones began writing when she was twelve.  After going through all the horse and dog books, she took to what she called "queen books,"  about women who were glamourous and powerful and captivating and did things.  When reading Young Bess, by Margaret Irwin, she became interested in a brief word portrait of Elizabeth's mother and thought that lady should have a book of her own.  Not knowing then that Anne Boleyn was historical novelists' favorite tragic heroine, she commenced to research and write.  As it turned out, she does not now write historical fiction but contemporary stories with implied social commentary.

 

She has been published in some literary magazines:  Phoebe, The New Orleans Review, Struggle, Palo Alto Review, Timber Creek Review, The Long Story, South Dakota Review, The Storyteller, and others now sadly defunct.  She has been included in the anthologies Tales From the Capitol, On the Clock, Elderhostel's Anniversary Odyssey, and Cactus Country.  Blue Cubicle Press published two chapbooks in their Overtime series, Things Happen That Way and Malignance.  She has had stories online in the magazines Midwest Literary Magazine, CC&D, and Comets and Criminals.  She won honorable mention in the 2008 Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition.

 

She has been a clerk, typist, caseworker for the NYC Department of Social Service, temp worker, caseworker for the Texas Income Maintenance, bookstore clerk (used, new, and remainder stores), telemarketer, substitute teacher, retail sales clerk and cashier, mail prepper (private), and door greeter.  There are stories everywhere.

 

She was born in Shreveport, Louisiana, and lived in little towns in north and south Louisiana.  Her family moved to Dallas when she was in junior high school.  She won the local Ready Writing championship when she was at W. H. Adamson High School.  Her English teacher, Mrs. Underwood, sponsored her for a scholarship to college.  She got a BA in English from Texas Woman's University.  She lived in the co-op dorm, a system in which the girls did their own cooking and cleaning, a form of scholarship. 

 

Besides small Louisiana towns and Big D, she has lived in New York City, New Orleans, Austin, and Mesquite.  She now lives in a trailer house in her sister's back yard outside of Hot Springs, AR.  The directions to her place include "turn off the paved road."