August 12, 2010 When a debut novel gets this much media attention and inspires this kind of intense, high-level conversation among reviewers like Slate’s Hanna Rosin and The New Yorker’s Margaret Talbot, it was bound to happen: Adam Ross’s Mr. Peanut has made the short list for The Center for Fiction’s 2010 Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize.
August 5, 2010 Remember that quaint little rule of etiquette that cautioned people to avoid politics and religion in polite conversation? East Tennessee novelist Amy Greene breaks it today on the op-ed page of The New York Times—but only to make the point that religion has no place in a political campaign. The daughter and granddaughter of ministers who believed fervently in the separation of church and state, Greene takes contemporary preachers to task for failing to understand this basic tenet of American democracy.
August 2, 2010 Marilyn Kallet’s poem “Firelies” is this week’s offering from American Life in Poetry. About it former Poet Laureate Ted Kooser writes, “Over the years I have read many poems about fireflies, but of all of them hers seems to offer the most and dearest peace.”
July 30, 2010 This bulletin just in: the sky, contrary to earlier reports, is not falling. Books are not dying, beloved authors are not destined for the poorhouse, and neither the Kindle nor the iPad will murder serious literature. That’s what David “Skip” Prichard, CEO of the LaVergne-based Ingram Content Group, believes, at least. And if anyone should know whereof he speaks on this subject, surely it’s the guy in charge of running a company with 2.6 million books for sale.
July 19, 2010 Bill Friskics-Warrren, Silas House, Amanda Little, Adam Ross, Rebecca Skloot, and Abraham Verghese are popping up all over the news scene:
Music journalist Bill Friskics-Warren, author of I’ll Take You There: Pop Music and the Urge for Transcendence, memorializes Nashville songwriter Hank Cochran in this obituary in The New York Times. “Heartache was Mr. Cochran’s great theme as a songwriter,” he writes.
July 15, 2010 Award-winning novelist and short-story writer Richard Bausch will teach an unusual writing workshop this fall at the University of Memphis, where he holds the Moss Chair of Excellence in English. University students are not eligible for the course; it is open only to members of the community, and aspiring writers who are selected will attend free of charge. Ten to twelve applicants will be chosen. Classes will meet weekly in the evening, beginning the last week of August.
