Fiction. Don Noble follows up on his immensely popular Climbing Mount Cheaha to produce another anthology of Alabama fiction—comic, this time. The collection includes the following writers: Caroline Haines, Jack Pendarvis, William Cobb, Brad Watson, Barry Hannah, Wendy Reed, Lee Smith, Michael Knight, Pat Meyer, Bart Barton, Madison Jones, Dan Wallace, Suzanne Hudson, Joe Formicella, Joe Taylor, Eugene Walter, Truman Capote, and Michelle Richmond. "I didn't know there were this many funny Alabamians, well, except maybe in an election season. But because of A STATE OF LAUGHTER, I now know what a bugle head is, that an old woman can do a lot of damage with a 14-inch hog knife, and that—when arrested for soliciting—it is hard to keep both hands on your head and step out of a car, even when the police tell you to"—Rick Bragg.