Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Forge | 1931 | T.S. Stribling | Buy |
| 2 | The Store | 1932 | T.S. Stribling | Buy |
| 3 | Unfinished Cathedral | 1934 | T.S. Stribling | Buy |
The Vaiden Trilogy is T.S. Stribling’s most significant literary achievement, tracing the Vaiden family across three generations in the American South. The Forge, published in 1931, begins during the Civil War. The Store, which won the 1933 Pulitzer Prize, picks up during Reconstruction as the family navigates a changing economy and social order. Unfinished Cathedral, the final volume, moves into the twentieth century as old Southern institutions crumble.
Stribling uses the Vaiden family to examine how the South changed after the war, and he does not romanticize the process. The books deal frankly with race, corruption, and the gap between what Southern society claimed to be and what it actually was. While his contemporaries Faulkner and Wolfe have received more lasting attention, Stribling’s trilogy offers a clear-eyed account of the same territory.