Book Reviews

November 9, 2011 In Lions of the West: Heroes and Villains of the Westward Expansion, bestselling novelist and historian Robert Morgan tells the true stories of the men who added the territories from the Appalachians to the Pacific, thereby making a country out of a continent. Morgan will discuss Lions of the West at 7 p.m. on November 14 at the Hodges Library on the University of Tennessee campus in Knoxville.

November 8, 2011 John McPhee is known for taking obscure topics and making them fascinating. As McPhee heads to Tennessee this week to accept the eighth annual Nashville Public Library Literary Award, Chapter 16’s Michael Ray Taylor considers the legendary author’s influence on the craft of creative nonfiction. McPhee will give a free public reading at the Nashville Public Library on November 12 at 10 a.m.

November 3, 2011 In much of his work—which spans two collections of poetry, essays, a play, collaborations with other artists and writers, and two memoirs—Nick Flynn has grappled with a tragic family history, and he bears his own deep scars, too: years of drug and alcohol use, a string of damaged relationships with women. But out of this well of grief, Flynn has pulled a well-received body of literature. His newest memoir, The Ticking is the Bomb, again mines this difficult past to critical acclaim. It is a survivor’s tale—the voice of a troubled mind still struggling to make sense of the wreckage, still doubtful of its own stability. Flynn will read from his work at Vanderbilt University in Nashville on November 10 at 7 p.m. in Furman Hall, Room 114. The event is free and open to the public.

November 2, 2011 NPR says John Jeremiah Sullivan is “the best magazine writer around.” Time magazine names him “the New Tom Wolfe.” The New York Times Book Review calls Sullivan’s new collection, Pulphead, “the sort of essay-world you just want to dwell inside.” Sullivan will read from and sign copies of Pulphead at The Booksellers at Laurelwood in Memphis on November 5 at 1 p.m. He will also read in Nashville on November 19 at 1 p.m. at the Nashville Public Library as part of the Salon@615 series. Both events are free and open to the public.