Mystery and mayhem at a summer theater camp in the Berkshires
“The play’s the thing” in Twelfth, Janet Key’s debut novel for middle-grade readers. It was not 12-year-old Maren Sands’ idea to attend Charlotte Goodman Theater Camp. Now she’s stuck in the middle of the woods with a bunch of theater kids she doesn’t know — and, as it turns out, possibly a ghost. Janet Key will appear at the 2022 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville on October 14-16.
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Rick Bragg’s canine love story about the worst dog in the world
FROM THE CHAPTER 16 ARCHIVE: Rick Bragg’s The Speckled Beauty is about finding the heart to love the most wayward and aggravating dog imaginable, who also turns out to be smart, tenacious, loyal, fearless, full of life, and just what the doctor ordered for a man who is learning new lessons about losing and letting go. Bragg will appear at the 2022 Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville on October 14-16.
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Magical adventures await a heroine who refuses to be defined by her disability
Natalie Lloyd’s signature style shines throughout Hummingbird, a delightful yet poignant mashup of reality and fantasy, highlighting the heartbreak of the body’s physical limitations versus a soaring spirit and boundless imagination. Natalie Lloyd will discuss Hummingbird at Parnassus Books in Nashville on August 3.
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Intrigue abounds in a town where ghosts are less threatening than the living
With The Promise of Lost Things, Nashville writer Helene Dunbar adds another page-turning chapter to the story of St. Hilaire, New York, and its spooky residents – both living and dead – begun in her 2020 novel, Prelude for Lost Souls. Dunbar will discuss the book at Parnassus Books in Nashville on July 27.
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A writer reflects on her long relationship with Chapter 16
It’s been more than 10 years since I took those tentative and unwitting steps toward a part-time career as a “professional writer,” a label I never would have dared apply to myself until Margaret Renkl gave me permission.
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A rare map points the way to a dreamlike — yet deadly — destination
When a young woman’s estranged father is found dead, her investigation into a seemingly insignificant vintage map in his possession leads her down a path fraught with riddles, conspiracies, secrets, and lies. Peng Shepherd’s The Cartographers is an otherworldly thriller that will appeal to fans of V.E. Schwab’s The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue and Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library.
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