For promotions and press needs, you’ll find below—in order—a short and long bio, a selection of author photos (both official and candid), book cover art, and reviews. Permission is freely granted to use any or all of the following materials for such purposes. If additional materials are required, please contact me.
Short Author Bio
Leah Weiss is an acclaimed southern author who has published three books in her 70s: If The Creek Don’t Rise, All The Little Hopes, and The Creek, The Crone and The Crow. Her books have been Library Reads, Indie Next and a SIBA Okra Pick. They were honored as finalists for the Library of Virginia’s Literary Awards and nominated for the Southern Book Prize. Her third novel is a return to Appalachia and Baines Creek and is told by beloved characters from the first two books. Her books have sold more than 250,000 copies.
Longer Author Bio
Leah Weiss is a southern writer born in North Carolina and living in Virginia. She holds degrees from Dunbarton College in Washington DC and Kent State University. In her late fifties, she began writing memoirs about her mother’s humble life on a tobacco farm in North Carolina. Those and other short stories have appeared in Deep South Magazine, Serving House Journal and a Simple Life Magazine. In 2015, Leah retired from a 24-year career as the Headmaster’s Assistant at Virginia Episcopal School, signed with a New York agent and began her writing career.
Her debut novel IF THE CREEK DON’T RISE, released in 2017, was developed from her first national winning short story. CREEK was selected as a Library Reads, Indie Next, SIBA Okra Pick. It was honored as a 2018 finalist for the Library of Virginia’s Literary Fiction and People’s Choice Awards. Her second novel, ALL THE LITTLE HOPES, released in 2021, was a Library Reads, BAM’s December 2021 book club choice, and named a Best Book for Fall 2021 by Country Living Magazine. It was also a 2022 finalist for the Library of Virginia’s People’s Choice Award. Her first two books have sold more than 250,000 copies.
Her much-anticipated third novel, THE CREEK, THE CRONE AND THE CROW released in March of 2026 and is a return to the shadow world of Appalachia and remote Baines Creek. It is told by beloved characters from her first two books. It was named an April Indie Next by Independent Booksellers.
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REVIEWS FOR THE CREEK, THE CRONE AND THE CROW
The Creek, The Crone, and the Crow is an impressive blend of history, folklore, and imagination. Kate Shaw and Lydia Brown are memorable characters who are courageous and persevering in their fight against injustice.
—Ron Rash, NYT Bestselling Author, SERENA, THE CARETAKER, THE COVE, and more.
…Reading THE CREEK, THE CRONE AND THE CROW is an immersive exploration of a distinctive setting and the alluring people who inhabit it. A divine and captivating story, it’s one I hope readers will enjoy as much as I did.
–Donna Everhart, USA Today bestselling author of WHERE THE JESSAMINE GROWS, WOMEN OF A PROMISCUOUS NATURE and more.
Thanks to Leah Weiss for writing the women of Appalachia back into history. Filled with folklore, folk remedies, and mountain wisdom, THE CREEK, THE CRONE, AND THE CROW is a beautiful tribute to a fading piece of unique Americana. This is a novel for book clubs to savor.
–Pamela Klinger-Horn, Valley Bookseller, LITERATURE LOVERS’ NIGHT OUT™️
I loved this story filled with Appalachian lore & mystery. Strong sense of place and steeped in Appalachian lore–I wanted every bit of it to be true.
– Amy Dance, The Snail on the Wall
It’s a gift and a joy to read one of Leah Weiss’s books. Her descriptions of the natural world and well-crafted characters stay with you for years. She writes intelligently yet lovingly about Appalachia and the people who live in the small community of Baines Creek. This powerful and moving story is one you don’t want to miss.
– Mary Patterson, The Little Bookshop
REVIEWS FOR ALL THE LITTLE HOPES
Like all great southern writers, Leah Weiss’s magic turns the local into the universal. All the Little Hopes is both a deep-dive into the life of a North Carolina town during WWII and a national portrait of an era with all of its attendant glories and pains… Lucy Brown and Allie Bert Tucker will break your heart, but Leah Weiss’s beautiful writing will sew it back together again.
Wiley Cash, NYT Bestselling Author, A HAND MORE KIND THAN HOME and WHEN GHOSTS COME HOME.
With her latest novel ALL THE LITTLE HOPES, Leah Weiss confirms the place she’s earned among top-notch historical fiction writers. Her thrilling, coming-of-age story… is compelling, alarming, and heart-breakingly satisfying. It grippingly explores the mysteries of one of my favorite themes: Who can really be trusted when the chips are down?”
David Gilham, NYT Bestselling Author, CITY OF WOMEN
ALL THE LITTLE HOPES is the kind of wise, compassionate and deeply empathetic novel that we all need right now…It’s a novel with an irresistible emotional momentum, as we follow all the ways its characters cope with a war come home. Weiss’s lyrical sentences are in themselves little wonders, tugging us along, delivering us to one surprising place after another and, in so doing, somehow restoring us to ourselves.
Tommy Hays, author of THE PLEASURE WAS MINE AND IN THE FAMILY WAY.
Retired Director of the Great Smokies Writing Program and Lecturer Emeritus at University of North Carolina