Flannery O'Connor may now be acknowledged as the "Great American Catholic Author," but this was not always the case. With Creating Flannery O'Connor, Daniel Moran explains how O'Connor attained that status, and how she felt about it, by examining the development of her literary reputation from the perspectives of critics, publishers, agents, adapters for other media, and contemporary readers.

Moran tells the story of O'Connor's evolving career and the shaping of her literary identity. Drawing from the Farrar, Straus & Giroux archives at the New York Public Library and...