Chapter 16 - Part 9

Maternal Instincts

Kay West documents an adoptive mother’s love for a tragically abused child

By Liz Garrigan | August 15, 2011

August 15, 2011 Six years ago, Florida authorities investigated a child neglect case so vile and gut-wrenching that even an experienced social worker and a cop found themselves vomiting at the scene. In a small house full of filth, barely clothed and confined to a foul closet, was a profoundly neglected six-year-old girl named Dani. Now Nashville author Kay West has written a book about how Diane and Bernie Lierow came to welcome Dani into their family. She recently spoke with Chapter 16 by phone about Dani’s Story.

Sex and the City

Bill Loehfelm’s third novel, set in a seamy corner of Staten Island, is disturbing, dirty—and irresistible

By Liz Garrigan | June 14, 2011

June 14, 2011 Maureen Coughlin—an underdog oppressed by her own low ambition and everyone else’s belief that she’ll never accomplish anything beyond waiting tables—sees something that was never meant for her eyes: either a homoerotic encounter between unlikely lovers, or an only vaguely consensual act meant to satisfy a debt. By the time the answer becomes clear, the 29-year-old protagonist has found herself involved in a murder investigation whose chief suspect is rich, powerful, and a shoo-in for the U.S. Senate. Bill Loehfelm’s The Devil She Knows is a consuming thriller that has it all: sex, politics, class warfare, and an unlikely hero impossible not to root for. Loehfelm will sign books at 6 p.m. on June 14 at The Booksellers at Laurelwood in Memphis.

Killer Reading

Jane Bradley’s new book is a horrifying crime novel that somehow manages to inspire hope

By Liz Garrigan | May 18, 2011

May 18, 2011 It’s the rare novel that can detail horrific evil and still illuminate the best of the human spirit, turning a reader thoughtful, inward, almost spiritual. That’s what Chattanooga native Jane Bradley has managed to do with her new book You Believers, a heartbreaking narrative with a capacity for finding deliverance in the wake of a life devastated by evil. Bradley will sign copies of the book at 7 p.m. on May 19 at Barnes & Noble Booksellers in Brentwood.

Home is a Long Way From Here

Linda Leaming writes a fascinating memoir about finding herself, and a family, in Bhutan

By Liz Garrigan | April 1, 2011

April 1, 2011 Years ago, when Linda Leaming first saw photos of a friend’s trip to the Himalayan country of Bhutan, wanderlust trumped prudence, and she decided to see this overlooked dot on the map for herself. Once there, she stayed for more than a decade. Married to Bhutan: How One Woman Got Lost, Said “I Do” and Found Bliss is equal parts diary, travel guide, and history lesson—Leaming’s tribute to a culture arguably more evolved than our own. Linda Leaming will sign copies of the book from 5 to 8 p.m. on April 7 at Nashville’s Cumberland Gallery. Artwork by Leaming’s husband, Bhutanese artist Phurba Namgay, will be on display.

Ms. Cheap Talks Love

Mary Hance releases a new book of marriage advice, and there’s not a coupon among the tips

By Liz Garrigan | February 10, 2011

February 10, 2011 There is probably no other Tennessean columnist—nor any journalist in Nashville, for the that matter—who is more connected to the daily’s readers than Mary Hance, known to the masses as Ms. Cheap. After all, everyone wants to save a buck. Hance, author of several previous books, has now parlayed her popularity into a new title, Love For a Lifetime: Daily Wisdom and Wit for a Long and Happy Marriage, a sort of Life’s Little Instruction Book of wedlock. Hance will discuss the book on February 13 at 2 p.m. at Barnes & Noble Booksellers in Cool Springs, at 6 p.m. at Davis-Kidd Booksellers in Memphis, and at 5:30 p.m. on March 3 at the Belle Meade Plantation in Nashville.

Typo-Cast

Two underemployed spelling geeks set out to rid the world of errata

By Liz Garrigan | October 13, 2010

October 13, 2010 In a culture dominated by texting, tweeting, and emailing—media that have accelerated the decline of spelling, grammar, and word use—it seems unlikely that a pair of twenty-somethings would be the orthographic heroes of our time, bounding across the country, Wite-Out in hand, to fix our collective mistakes. But that’s the story Jeff Deck and Benjamin D. Herson tell in their entertaining memoir, The Great Typo Hunt. Deck and Herson will discuss the book at Davis-Kidd Booksellers in Nashville on October 15 at 7 p.m.

Red Dead's History: A Video Game, an Obsession, and America's Violent Past

By Tore C. Olsson
St. Martin's Press
288 pages
$30

“I recommend Red Dead’s History unreservedly not only to fans of the iconic video game, but also to anyone who wants to understand the riotousness — from Wild West gunslingers to Jim Crow to lynching — that darkened our past, and which continues to influence our culture. Olsson’s prose is graceful, his analysis profound. This is history at its most accessible and exciting.”

~Peter Cozzens, award-winning author of A Brutal Reckoning