Q & A

For more than thirty years, David Maraniss has been a reporter for The Washington Post, winning one Pulitzer Prize for reporting and sharing in another, all while writing several bestselling and critically acclaimed nonfiction books. A witness to the technological sea changes that have engulfed traditional newspapers and, some claim, made them increasingly irrelevant, Maraniss now issues for the first time a collection of his finest newspaper stories. Into the Story: A Writer’s Journey Through Life, Politics, Sports, and Loss reminds readers why newspapers mattered in the first place. Maraniss will read from and sign the book at McNeely Pigott & Fox in Nashville on February 23.

As a commentator for Fox News and National Public Radio, Juan Williams is a lightning rod for both the right and the left. His sixth book, Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America—and What We Can Do About It, explores the disconnect between the decisive victories of the civil-rights movement and the ground-level state of affairs for black Americans, who continue to live, he says, “as if they were locked out from all America has to offer.” On February 13, Williams will be at the Nashville Public Library to moderate a panel discussion titled “A New Dialogue in Civil Rights,” which includes Rev. James Lawson, Betty Flores, and Daniel Losen. The event commemorates the fifty-year anniversary of Nashville’s student-led demonstrations and sit-ins.

A decade ago, few Americans knew the disturbing truth behind the factory farms that supply them with breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Eric Schlosser‘s books have caused a wakening in consumers—and are slowly having a positive impact on the very system he exposed. In advance of his appearance at Belmont University on February 15, he recently discussed his work, and his recent film Food, Inc., in an interview with Chapter 16.

In an interview with Chapter 16, author Randall Kenan discusses his latest book, The Fire This Time—an essay collection in which he considers the contemporary African American experience with passion—and in a voice that’s all his own. On January 28, Kenan will discuss his work in Room 101 of Buttrick Hall on the Vanderbilt University campus.