"The best first novel to come out of the South since Deliverance." - New Republic
"A masterly and urgent first novel." - Los Angeles Magazine
"Ben Greer dips deeply into a pool of terror." - New York Times
"An electrifying novel of prison life, tough, powerful, and terrifying. It transforms today's headlines into heart-stopping literature. A sociological tour de force." - Boston Globe
"An ideal novel: well paced, absolutely absorbing, populated with superbly realized characters, not over-long, redolent with the scent of authenticity and infused with just enough serious content to alleviate the guilt of being entertained." - Chicago Sun Times
SLAMMER (Novel)
Atheneum Publishers, 1975
Avon Books, 1976
Robert Hale Publishers, 1977
The Voices of the South Series, LSU Press, 2002
"Lush and sinister ... truly fine." - New Republic
"Compulsive reading and an impressive achievement in sheer writing." - Fort Worth Star Telegram
"A young novelist who uses words like weapons ... a nearly relentless torrent of tension." - Grand Rapids Press
"Greer again achieves the power shown in his first novel, Slammer, in a stunning second one, Halloween." - Booklist
"Greer writes with wonderful authority, strong, cadenced and projective. A novel of true atmosphere and fine isolated execution. Excellent!"
- Kirkus Reviews
HALLOWEEN (Novel)
MacMillan Publishers, 1978
Avon Books, 1980
"As rollicking as it promises to be." - New York Times
"Times Loves a Hero is a pop version of the classic form of the bildungsroman, tracing the growth and experience of a young American hero who carries unavoidable echoes of Fitzgerald's narrator of The Great Gatsby, and all of the awkward adolescent dreams of Twain's Huck and Tom."
- Richard Loney, Sherbrooke Record, Quebec
"Greer produces some of the finest erotic writing this side of John Updike, as well as postcard-perfect snapshots of rugged Black Island."
- Erica Abeel, New Woman
TIMES LOVES A HERO (novel)
Doubleday Publishers, 1986
"A fascinating book from a wonderful writer."
- Library Journal
"Ben Greer understands Southern life, right down to the necessity of using black iron cookware to prepare a country meal." - Pleasantville Atlantic City Press
"The Loss of Heaven is an entertaining Southern soap opera about the life of a powerful South Carolina newspaper family and how they handle the turmoil of the 1960s." - Jim Barber, UPI
THE LOSS OF HEAVEN (Novel)
Doubleday Publishers, 1988
"Presumed Guilty is a sharp rebuke to the tactics of Federal investigators." - Boston Globe
PRESUMED GUILTY (Biography)
Wyrick and Co. Press, 1995
"Don't read this book at night, or if you do, don't go to sleep. Jasper Goode can creep into anything, even dreams."
- Henry Taylor, winner of the Pulitzer Prize
"This sumbitch rips right along at such a quick march that one pants just in trying to keep the pages turned in order ... it holds us in a steely grip." - Fred Chappell, winner of the Bollingen Prize
"In language which is spare and clean, Ben Greer has written a thriller initiated by the (so far) unsolved murder of his owen father. If you pick up this book, you will not put it down until the last revelation rattles your bones." - George Garrett, winner of the PEN/Malamud Award
MURDER IN THE HOLY CITY (Novel)
Texas Review Press, 2006
"What a pleasure it is to open a book and find a live necessity in the words." - Richard Wilbur, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award and the Bollingen Prize
"A tough-minded poet who seems urgently compelled to tell the truth, Ben Greer is a master storyteller." - X.J. Kennedy, winner of the Lamont Award of the American Academy of Poets and the Los Angeles Book Award for poetry
"There are poems here that really take the top of your head off."
- William Jay Smith, former U.S. Poet Laureate, Consultant in Poetry at the Library of Congress
A LATE DISORDER (Poetry)
Bay Oak Publishers, 2007
"A splendid gothic drama." - Sybil Christopher, co-founder with Mike Nichols of The New Theatre, New York City
LITTLE TIN GODS (Play)
Produced by Theatre South, 2008
"The best of these poems - and there are many - are scenes of inner struggle, uncompromising arguments with the self conducted with heart and wit." - Billy Collins, former U.S. Poet Laureate
"A list of the successful poems in The Bright House would be almost as long as the table of contents." - Richard Wilbur, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award and the Bollingen Prize
THE BRIGHT HOUSE (Poetry)
Texas Review Press, 2011
"Greer's poetry reveals the broken and troubled history of the making of a man who has lived through an America in deep turmoil. In the end, poetry is his language of prayer and hope, a comfort." - Kwame Dawes, editor-in-chief of Prairie Schooner, author of Nebraska
"The Naked Prince is a fine collection, to reread and to keep." - Henry Taylor, Pulitzer Prize winner
THE NAKED PRINCE: NEW AND SELECTED POEMS
Press 53, 2020