May 18, 2012 Knoxville is a city that treasures its writers: both local newspapers—the Knoxville News Sentinel and Metro Pulse—routinely cover books and author events; its independent bookstore, Union Ave. Books, hosts frequent readings and book-club meetings; the public library sponsors a world-class Children’s Festival of Reading each year; and the University of Tennessee, which boasts a “Writers in the Library” program and a creative-writing department, has a Ph.D. program in writing that’s ranked fifth in the entire nation for funding. In other words, novelist Christopher Hebert landed in a good town.

May 17, 2012 Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on whether you’re referring to literary artistry or raw book sales—Between Shades of Gray by Nashville novelist Ruta Sepetys is frequently being confused with a novel by a similar name: Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James. Both authors are on book tour this spring. Sepety’s book is a YA novel about a young girl’s incarceration in Stalin’s death camps. James’s is about… something else.