Editor’s Notes

In Tennessee and around the world, we’ve been immersed in remembrances of Dolly Parton. Her gifts as a singer-songwriter, her personal kindness, and her tremendous generosity have been widely celebrated, so we won’t try to round up all those tributes here (though we can’t resist sharing Margaret Renkl’s Dolly story and this thoughtful piece by Nashville music writer Craig Havighurst).  But…

In partnership with the 2026 Southern Festival of Books, Nashville’s The Porch will be offering workshops with festival authors on Friday, October 16. Instructors include Susannah Felts, Asa Drake, Sun Yung Shin, Emily Nemens, Ramona Ausubel, and Kayla Rae Whitaker. The workshops will be held at the Tennessee State Museum. Full info and a link to register for the workshops can be found here.  AI is…

It’s an all-Q&A lineup at Chapter 16 this week with three Tennessee authors discussing their new books. Joe Pagetta, the director of communications at the Tennessee State Museum, answers questions from Maggie Gigandet about The Apostle of Tennessee: The Indefatigable Life and Ministry of Father Aloysius Orengo. Pagetta notes that Father Orengo’s story is “an American one” about “an immigrant who…

It’s a little difficult in these hot, humid days to fantasize about wandering around Bicentennial Mall in the crisp air of an October weekend, but the 2026 Southern Festival of Books will be here before you know it. This week, Chapter 16 considers a book by one of this year’s festival authors, poet Asa Drake. Reviewer sam long writes that Maybe the Body is…

Chapter 16 returns from hiatus today, and we’ve got a busy season of book coverage ahead. But first we’d like to take a moment to acknowledge the loss of two members of the Tennessee literary community. The state’s longtime poet laureate, Margaret Britton Vaughn, known to her friends as Maggi, died on June 27. Serenity Gerbman, who directs Humanities…

Today at Chapter 16, Lauren Nossett answers a few questions about her latest thriller, Indie Darling, which sends a Dolly Parton-loving private detective searching for a missing singer-songwriter. Nossett tells Sarah Norris that the novel, despite its dark and unsettling side, is “a love letter to Nashville.”  David Wesley Williams reviews Stranded in the Future, the second memoir from “pop surrealist” Robyn Hitchcock. “Hitchcock…