Q & A

October 2, 2015 In a book that includes lavish illustrations and a twenty-track CD, Fiona Ritchie, creator and host of the long-running public radio program The Thistle and Shamrock, and Doug Orr, founder of the Swannanoa musical workshops, have produced an authoritative history of traditional American music. The pair will discuss Wayfaring Strangers: The Musical Voyage from Scotland and Ulster to Appalachia during the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville on October 9-11, 2015.

September 30, 2015 In his new memoir Bobby Braddock: A Life on Nashville’s Music Row, Country Music Hall of Famer Bobby Braddock looks back over a life that coincides with some of the South’s most significant social and political changes. Braddock will discuss the book at three Nashville events: on October 3, 2015, at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum; on October 9, 2015, at the Southern Festival of Books; and October 19, 2015, at Barnes & Noble at Vanderbilt.

September 28, 2015 In a career spanning five decades, Paul Theroux has produced fifty-one books of fiction and nonfiction, including The Mosquito Coast, The Great Railway Bazaar, and other notable titles. In his new book he chronicles extensive travels through the American South. Theroux will discuss Deep South during the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 9-11, 2015.

September 24, 2015 Ruth Reichl was devastated when the magazine she edited, Gourmet, shut down. Where does a food writer go when there’s nowhere to go? The kitchen, of course. Reichl’s first cookbook, My Kitchen Year: 136 Recipes that Saved My Life, chronicles her rediscovery of the pleasures of cooking. Reichl will discuss the book at the Nashville Public Library on October 1, 2015, at 6:15 p.m.

September 21, 2015 Fans of Jenny Lawson’s blog—and her first book, Let’s Pretend This Never Happened—know to expect an offbeat and raucous view of the world. Lawson doesn’t disappoint in Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things, which addresses the author’s lifelong struggle with depression. Lawson will appear at the Nashville Public Library on September 30, 2015, at 6:15 p.m.