Chapter 16 - Part 490

The Pain of What Might Have Been

In a compelling new history, Candice Millard retells the tragedy of the Garfield assassination

By Chris Scott | October 12, 2011

October 12, 2011 Charles Guiteau did much more than kill James Garfield. As Candice Millard explains in Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President, the deranged Guiteau deprived America of a potentially great president. Even in death Garfield inspired much of the reform that he advocated in his too-short term of office. His murder, Millard writes, “brought tremendous change to the country he loved—change that, had it come earlier, almost certainly would have spared his life.” Millard will appear at the 2011 Southern Festival of Books, held October 14-16 in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.

Right Before Your Very Eyes

Erin Morgenstern’s debut novel, The Night Circus, is a spellbinding read

By Sarah Norris | October 11, 2011

October 11, 2011 Erin Morgenstern, the debut author of one of this fall’s most anticipated novels, is drawing widespread comparisons to both J.K. Rowling and Stephanie Meyer. With The Night Circus, the thirty-three-year-old multimedia artist has not only crafted a story of epic proportions but also turned her own life into a fairy tale, replete with what looks to be a very happy ending.

After the Breakup

NYT-bestselling author Marisa de los Santos talks with Chapter 16 about love and friendship in her new novel

By Fernanda Moore | October 10, 2011

October 10, 2011 As she did in her first two novels (Love Walked In and Belong To Me), Marisa de los Santos carefully explores the nuances of every type of love—filial, familial, and romantic—in her new novel, Falling Together. For de los Santos, romantic love may get all the sonnets, but true friendship can be more passionate, more enduring, and more excruciating to lose. She will appear at the 2011 Southern Festival of Books, held October 14-16 in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.

Gossip Guy

Jay McInerney gives New York magazine the scoop on his real role in Gossip Girl

By Margaret Renkl | October 10, 2011

October 10, 2011 Novelist Jay McInerney’s small, recurring role on the teen television show Gossip Girl is not a cameo performance. Although the character he plays, Jeremiah Harris, is also a novelist with some very McInerneyish characteristics, the resemblance has become less clear as the character has evolved: “All I can say is I’m really glad that I did not let them name the character Jay McInerney, because the character increasingly diverges from me,” the former Nashville resident told New York magazine in an article published today.

Finally!

Amazon agrees to collect sales tax in Tennessee beginning in 2014

By Margaret Renkl | October 7, 2011

October 7, 2011 In good news for the state’s bricks-and-mortar bookstores and other local retailers, Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam announced yesterday that Amazon.com has agreed to begin collecting sales taxes from buyers in the state on January 1, 2014.

Extra Innings

Chad Harbach’s first novel creates an engrossing world within—and without—the baseball diamond

By Michael Ray Taylor | October 7, 2011

October 7, 2011 As Bernard Malamud and W.P. Kinsella did before him, in The Art of Fielding Chad Harbach has reinvented baseball within a universe of his own creation, a place that is not quite the world as we know it, but a world as it might exist within the infinite lines stretching outward from home through first and third base. Harbach will appear at the 2011 Southern Festival of Books, held October 14-16 in Nashville. All events are free and open to the public.