Thomas Gerald Franklin (born July 7, 1963) is an American writer originally from Dickinson, Alabama, United States. Franklin's first book is collection of ten short stories, Poachers (1999), the title story of which won the Edgar Award for Best Mystery Short Story. His first novel, Hell at the Breech (2003), is better described as being regional fiction. It is a fictionalized version of an actual violent feud in 1892 called the Mitcham War ,that took place in Clarke County, Alabama, near the author's home. Franklin co-wrote the novel The Tilted World (2013) with his wife Fennelly, who have been praised as being "the king and queen of contemporary Southern literature." Less