Chapter 16 - Part 357

No Surrender

Carl Hiaasen talks about his wacky style of Florida thriller, teen edition

By Michael Ray Taylor | September 30, 2014

September 30, 2014 In twenty-three novels, two books of nonfiction, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning column for the Miami Herald, Carl Hiaasen has captured the weird side of Florida life—and crime—like no other writer. In Skink—No Surrender, his first YA novel, Hiassen pairs a beloved character from his adult books with a teen narrator. Hiassen will appear at the Nashville Public Library on October 6, 2014, at 6:15 p.m. The event, part of the Salon@615 series, is free and open to the public.

Walking the Good Path

Linda Leaming, who found happiness in Bhutan, has some advice for worried Westerners

By Faye Jones | September 29, 2014

September 29, 2014 In A Field Guide to Happiness: What I Learned in Bhutan about Living, Loving, and Waking Up, Linda Leaming combines fascinating descriptions of a mystical country with funny, touching, and sometimes harrowing stories about her life there. It’s enough to make even the most travel-phobic reader dream about buying a plane ticket for this hard-to-reach land. Leaming will appear at Parnassus Books in Nashville on October 1, 2014, and at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 10-12, 2014.

“First Words”

By Amy Billone | September 26, 2014

September 26, 2014 Amy Billone is a poet and a scholar who has published widely in both creative and academic journals. Her poetry collection, The Light Changes, was named a best book of the year in 2013 by Kirkus Reviews and won the 2014 IndieReader Discovery Award in Poetry. Billone, an Associate Professor of English at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, will give a free public reading at the University of Tennessee’s Hodges Library on September 29, 2014, at 7 p.m.

Leaving Home

New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow recalls his difficult youth in Fire Shut Up in My Bones

By Maria Browning | September 25, 2014

September 25, 2014 In his memoir, Fire Shut Up in My Bones, New York Times op-ed columnist Charles M. Blow tells the story of a small-town Southern childhood marked by poverty and sexual abuse. Blow will speak at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 10-12, 2014. All festival events are free and open to the public.

Lullaby Pictures

Nashville clay artist Susan Eaddy has created enchanting illustrations for a new bedtime book

By Julie Danielson | September 24, 2014

September 24, 2014 A welcome addition to the bedtime picture-book shelf, My Love for You Is the Sun is just right for drifting off to sleep—after, that is, you’ve oohed and aahed over Susan Eaddy’s charming clay illustrations. Eaddy will appear at Parnassus Books in Nashville on September 29, 2014, at 6:30 p.m. She will also appear at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 10-12, 2014.

A "Hair-Raising Tale"

Hamton Sides’s new nonfiction book, In the Kingdom of Ice, earns raves from critics

By Margaret Renkl | September 24, 2014

September 24, 2014 Hampton Sides’s new book, In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette, was released during the height of summer’s dog days, but the book’s critical reception has been far from icy.

Tender Headed (National Poetry Series)

By Olatunde Osinaike
Akashic Books
80 pages
17.95

“In Tender Headed, Olatunde Osinaike asks the question, what makes a man, and what makes a man like me? As he interrogates the inner and outer workings of masculinity in all its sharp and tender parts, and the way a Black man meets the world, his poems strut and duck and weave across their pages. These poems unpack the ingredients of being and make a meal of language.”

~ Camille Rankine, author of Incorrect Merciful Impulses