Chapter 16
A Community of Tennessee Writers, Readers & Passersby

Jane Marcellus

A Piercing Wail

Reckoning asks us all to come to terms with women’s experience

Reckoning by V (formerly Eve Ensler) asks readers to understand what violence does to women and anyone who is marginalized. She’ll appear at Parnassus Books in Nashville on February 6.

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Flowers Blooming in a Blizzard

Understanding the work of poetry and place

Joy Harjo’s Catching the Light offers short vignettes on the meaning of language, poetry, and place, taking us to a realm between ordinary reality and artistic vision.

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Rolling Back History

No Choice takes readers to the heart of post-Roe America

Becca Andrews’ No Choice takes readers to communities in the South and beyond where abortion rights have eroded, particularly with the fall of Roe v. Wade. Andrews will appear at the 2022 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville on October 14-16.

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A Different Appalachian Upbringing

Neema Avashia explores community and identity in the South and beyond

In Another Appalachia, Neema Avashia explores what it is like to grow up both gay and the daughter of immigrants, making sense of life as both insider and outsider.

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Tracking a Killer

Journalist Kathryn Miles trails a 1996 cold case

In Trailed: One Woman’s Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders, Kathryn Miles sets out to find who killed Julie Williams and Lollie Winans in Shenandoah National Park more than 25 years ago. In doing so, she discovers problems with the justice system and persistent misogyny in outdoor culture.  

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Stepping into Their Own Power

Destiny O. Birdsong’s protagonists are true to themselves

In Destiny O. Birdsong’s triptych novel, Nobody’s Magic, three Black women with albinism negotiate a racially complicated world. Birdsong will discuss Nobody’s Magic at a virtual event hosted by Parnassus Books in Nashville on February 8.

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