Comic artist Gene Luen Yang talks with Chapter 16 about getting graphic in school
In this 2013 interview, artist and author Gene Luen Yang discusses the evolution of the graphic novel. Yang’s own autobiographical book, American Born Chinese, was the first graphic novel nominated for a National Book Award and the first to win the American Library Association’s Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in young-adult literature.
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Betsy Phillips’s new novel, The Wolf’s Bane, launches a new series of limited-edition books
May 19, 2015 Betsy Phillips’s new book, The Wolf’s Bane, is the inaugural project of the Nashville Limited Edition Club. Founded by Jennifer Knowles of Brown Dog Bindery and Chuck Beard of East Side Story, the club will connect authors, artists, and bookbinders to create one-of-a-kind books published by Knowles and distributed by Beard. Phillips will launch The Wolf’s Bane with a reading at East Side Story in Nashville on May 22, 2015, at 6 p.m.
A unique writers’ group in Memphis has produced a book of first-hand accounts of homelessness
January 23, 2015 The Door of Hope Writing Group in Memphis is a weekly meet-up for homeless writers. The nonprofit’s new project, Writing Our Way Home: A Group Journey Out of Homelessness, chronicles both the hard times and big breakthroughs of writers living on the street.
Jesse Mathison gets his priorities straight with a new book of verse and images
April 30, 2014 Priorities is both a book of poetry accompanied by art and a book of art accompanied by poetry. The text and images contradict, coerce, command, and communicate with each other as the project marks a successful collaboration between Nashville poet Jesse Mathison and a group of visual artists who together form the Creek collective. The group will host an exhibition and book-release party on May 3 at 6 p.m. at the Frothy Monkey in downtown Nashville.
Slash Coleman’s new memoir is a funny, funky remembrance of family, art, and love
September 19, 2013 Slash Coleman, an award-winning performer and storyteller, is best known for his one-man Off-Broadway show and PBS special, The Neon Man and Me. In his new memoir, The Bohemian Love Diaries, Coleman shares his story of growing up in the South in the 1970s and 80s, surrounded by a family of off-beat artists whom the young writer finds alternately inspiring and confounding. Slash Coleman will be appearing at the 25th anniversary of the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 11-13. All festival events are free and open to the public.
Howlin’ Books in Nashville makes room on the shelf for music books and more
June 13, 2013 Howlin’ Books at Grimey’s Too is the brainchild of bookseller Gwil Owen and bookkeeper Jessica Kimbrough, who saw an under-served audience among Nashville’s readers. In the three months since the store opened, Howlin’ has become ground zero for the city’s bohemian literary set—post-hippies, neo-Beats—and the next generation of Kurt Vonnegut fans couldn’t be happier.
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