Book Reviews

October 17, 2012 Dennis Lehane built his literary reputation on postmodern thrillers that explore the lives of damaged South Boston cops, criminals, and private detectives. His masterpiece, Mystic River, marked him as a genre-bending literary artist who had achieved a rare alchemy of popular and critical appeal. Lehane’s reputation (and audience) has since grown exponentially, thanks to award-winning film adaptations of his work—Clint Eastwood’s Mystic River, Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island, and Ben Affleck’s Gone, Baby, Gone—and his teleplay work for HBO’s The Wire. In his new novel, Live by Night, Lehane offers all the tropes of noir: morally dubious anti-heroes; femmes fatales; cars, guns, and sharp suits; doomed love; and, above all, violence. Lehane will read from Live by Night at the Nashville Public Library on October 23 at 6:15 p.m. as part of the Salon@615 series. The event is free and open to the public.

October 16, 2012 Since his emergence in 1994 with the acclaimed collection The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, Sherman Alexie has mapped a career both prolific and virtuosic, penning dozens of stories, novels, poems, and screenplays. His work has been recognized with countless awards and honors, including the PEN/Faulkner, PEN/Malamud, and PEN/Hemingway Awards and the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature. Alexie is a gifted speaker, and his dynamic and irreverent performances draw unusually large crowds for literary readings. Sherman Alexie will appear on October 18 at Montgomery Bell Academy as part of the Salon@615 series . The event, which is free and open to the public, begins at 6:15 p.m. in the Dead Poets Society Auditorium in Lowry Hall, with a signing to follow. Parnassus Books will be on hand to sell copies.

October 10, 2012 An engrossing achievement in family narrative, Nancy Jensen’s The Sisters follows three generations of women, illuminating the way decisions—and secrets—can reverberate through decades, fundamentally shaping others’ lives in ways they may never fully understand. What emerges is a multigenerational family portrait that elegantly reveals its individual figures and allows them to reveal one another, while making deft leaps over broad sweeps of time and place. Nancy Jensen will discuss The Sisters at Nashville’s Southern Festival of Books on October 14 at 2 p.m. in Legislative Plaza, Room 31. All festival events are free and open to the public.

October 4, 2012 Within a week of its release, Junot Díaz’s new book, This Is How You Lose Her, appeared on The New York Times bestseller list. Rarely does a book of short stories—rarely does literary fiction by a Latino author—generate attention like this. Rarer still are collections that deserve such hype, but in this case, the excitement is well deserved. Díaz, who this week won a MacArthur “genius” grant, is the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, and his growing legion of fans ought to be well pleased, even thrilled, by the nine dynamic stories in this collection. Junot Díaz will discuss This is How You Lose Her at Nashville’s Southern Festival of Books on October 13 at 4 p.m. in the War Memorial Auditorium. All festival events are free and open to the public.