Chapter 16
A Community of Tennessee Writers, Readers & Passersby

All Woke Up and Nowhere to Go

The mad world of Padgett Powell’s You & Me can be frustrating, but it’s also playful and funny and oddly moving

August, 24, 2012 One of the characters in Padgett Powell’s new novel, You & Me, points out that some of the objects in the room in which they sit are crooked: “Should we straighten everything?” His friend answers, “I think not. I don’t think us capable, one, but I see no reason to undo the charm of things leaning. Things are finally getting in tune with us.” Readers who enjoy the “charm of things leaning” will find much to ponder in this hilarious, disturbing, poignant, and altogether perplexing volume from the author of recent cult favorite The Interrogative Mood and National Book Award nominee Edisto. Powell will discuss You & Me at the twenty-fourth annual Southern Festival of Books, held October 12-14 at Legislative Plaza in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.

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New Works A Comin’

Songwriter Steve Earle is set to write two new books

August 24, 2012 Legendary musician Steve Earle has announced that he is writing a memoir for Twelve, an imprint of the Hachette Book Group. The memoir will be “a literary work in three acts,” reports Rolling Stone: “The first act will tell the story of his friendship with mentor Townes Van Zandt. Next comes Earle’s ‘bottoming out’ in Nashville, where he was sent to prison and eventually got clean.

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Killer Kickoff

There’s still time to sign up for the Killer Nashville conference, which takes place this weekend

August 23, 2012 Killer Nashville, a yearly “Conference for Thriller, Suspense, and Mystery Writers and Literature Lovers” begins today at the Hutton Hotel in downtown Nashville. Registration is still available for this conference that, “Unlike other conferences and seminars… offers five different learning tracks for those with varied interests and experience levels: a Writing Track, a Publishing Track, a Career Management & Promotion Track, a Forensic Track, and a Fan Track,” according to its website.

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A Casual Gathering

Ann Patchett will share the stage with J.K. Rowling in New York City this fall

August 23, 2012 Entertainment Weekly said it best: “Does this sound like the best book club meeting ever?” In a recent post on its “Book Shelf” blog, the publication announced that J.K. Rowling will make a rare U.S. appearance to promote her new novel, The Casual Vacancy.

Can you guess who will be speaking alongside Rowling on the stage at New York City’s Lincoln Center?

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Catching the Playhouse Killer

Jeff Crook’s debut thriller is a hard-boiled Memphis crime novel—with ghosts

August 23, 2012 Jeff Crook spins up a maelstrom of exotic characters and macabre events in The Sleeping and the Dead, the first in what looks to be a powerful paranormal mystery series. Crook will read from The Sleeping and the Dead on August 30 at 6 p.m. at The Booksellers in Laurelwood in Memphis.

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A Father’s Journey

Journalist Buzz Bissinger shares a haunting, intimate account of his quest to know his special-needs son

August 22, 2012 In Buzz Bissinger’s Father’s Day: A Journey into the Mind & Heart of My Extraordinary Son a ten-day road trip across America is the backdrop for a haunting and brutally honest account of a father’s struggle to understand the adult his special-needs child has become. Bissinger, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of Friday Night Lights, presents an unforgettable portrait of his son Zach, a cognitively disabled man in his mid-twenties who speaks in nonstop non sequiturs, can name and give the birthday of every person he has ever met, and memorizes maps so accurately that his family refers to him as a “human GPS.” Bissinger will discuss Father’s Day at the twenty-fourth annual Southern Festival of Books, held October 12-14 at Legislative Plaza in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.

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