Flannery O'Connor wrote many short stories of very odd characters in the Deep South

It is the birthday of Southern writer Flannery O'Connor (1925), whose odd characters and themes of theology have won her a passionate following in literary circles. O'Connor was a devout Catholic surrounded by Southern Protestantism in Georgia. She wrote numerous short stories but only two novels, Wise Blood (1952) and The Violent Bear It Away (1960). Her short story collections include A Good Man Is Hard to Find (1955), Everything That Rises Must Converge (1965), and The Complete Stories (1971), which won the National Book Award. She died from lupus in 1964 at the age of 39.