February 17, 2015 Amy Hoffman has two families: the one she was born into, and the one she’s chosen along the way. Her memoirs tell both family histories with humor, honesty, and tenderness. Hoffman will give a free public reading in Nashville at Vanderbilt University’s Calhoun Hall, Room 109, on February 24, 2015, at 7 p.m.
February 10, 2015 Chapter 16 talks with Adam Ross, bestselling author of Mr. Peanut and Ladies and Gentlemen, about his work-in-progress, the story of a year in the life of a child actor. Ross will give a free public reading at the University of Tennessee’s Hodges Library in Knoxville on February 16, 2015, at 7 p.m.
February 2, 2015 In The Bone Season, Samantha Shannon’s runaway bestseller, the young clairvoyant Paige Mahoney has a talent for reading minds that continually lands her in mortal danger. The charismatic protagonist is back in Shannon’s new dystopian thriller, The Mime Order, and Shannon will read from the book at the Nashville Public Library on February 10, 2015, at 6:15 p.m. The event, part of the Salon@615 series, is free and open to the public.
January 20, 2015 Jonathan Miles has a gift for transforming life’s base materials into literary gold. His novels, Dear American Airlines (2008) and Want Not (2013), address dark, potentially dispiriting themes with a deft, comedic touch. Miles will give a free public reading at the University of Tennessee’s John C. Hodges Library in Knoxville on January 26, 2015, at 7 p.m.
January 12, 2015 For more than thirty years, Tim O’Brien has been regarded as one of the definitive voices of the Vietnam War. A literary trailblazer, he melds fact and fiction in texts that are both starkly realistic and surreal. O’Brien will be in Nashville on January 17, 2015, to share the stage with Tim O’Brien, the equally legendary Nashville musician, at a special benefit in support of The Porch Writers’ Collective.
January 7, 2015 Leah Stewart, the author of four critically acclaimed novels, is a graduate of Vanderbilt University in Nashville who has held teaching positions at both her alma mater and the University of the South in Sewanee. Stewart will return to Tennessee to give a reading in Vanderbilt’s Buttrick Hall, Room 101, on January 15, 2015, at 7 p.m. The event is free and open to the public.
