Chapter 16
A Community of Tennessee Writers, Readers & Passersby

Tennessee Stormwater

Andrew Siegrist rides the winding river of the human spirit in We Imagined It Was Rain

The winner of the 2020 C. Michael Curtis Short Story Book Prize, We Imagined It Was Rain is an immersive debut collection of loosely connected short stories from Tennessee native…

Noir Way Out

Willy Vlautin combines suspense and social commentary in The Night Always Comes

Willy Vlautin is concerned with America’s working poor. Whether you encounter his writing via his alt-country band Richmond Fontaine, his award-winning fiction, or the film The Motel Life (based on…

Unspoken Prayers

Ashleigh Bryant Phillips weaves a transcendent tapestry of stories in Sleepovers

…blood and proximity. Called “incantatory” by Lauren Groff, who judged it as the winner of the C. Michael Curtis Short Story Book Prize, Sleepovers is a transcendent tapestry of stories….

Death Is the Mother of Beauty

Poet Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum talks with Chapter 16 about grief, memory, and healing

Poet Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum’s Visiting Hours is a stunning elegy for Mary Interlandi, who in 2003 drove to the top of the Sheraton hotel parking garage in Nashville and leapt to…

TAKE THE SHORT READER SURVEY! CHAPTER 16 SURVEYOR SURVEYING