August 19, 2011 Born and raised in a Southern Ohio holler town called Knockemstiff, Donald Ray Pollock dropped out of high school to work in a meat-packing plant. After a brief time in Florida, he returned to Knockemstiff and spent the next thirty-some years at the paper mill in nearby Chillicothe. Taking night classes, he earned an English degree from Ohio University, and he learned to write fiction by typing out the stories of authors he admired: Denis Johnson, Flannery O’Connor, Ernest Hemingway. He published his first story, “Bactine,” when he was fifty-one, in the literary journal at Ohio State University. The editor was so impressed that she convinced him to enroll in Ohio State’s M.F.A program. Two years later, his short-story collection, Knockemstiff, was published to rave reviews. His first novel, The Devil All the Time, has just been released. Pollack, who will appear at the 2011 Southern Festival of Books, held October 14-16 in Nashville, recently took Chapter 16 on a tour of Knockemstiff.

July 15, 2011 A Lee Martin novel combines the fast pacing and suspense of a thriller with the craftsmanship and lyricism of literary fiction. One of Martin’s chief tactics is the drawn-out reveal: his characters cling to their secrets as long as they can, unburdening themselves slowly, layer by layer. In Martin’s fiction, revelation can lead to punishment (prison, retribution, outcasting), but it also, almost always, leads to freedom. We are only as sick, his fiction argues, as our secrets. Lee Martin will appear at the 2011 Southern Festival of Books, held October 14-16 in Nashville. Today he talks with Chapter 16 about his work.