2020 Southern Festival of Books | Chapter 16

The Singing Wire Between Joy and Grief

You Want More spans the career of one of the South’s most beloved storytellers

By Ed Tarkington | September 16, 2020

With You Want More: Selected Stories, Hub City Press delivers a career retrospective of the writer The New York Times called “among the great pillars of Southern literature.” George Singleton will discuss the book with Ashleigh Bryant Phillips at a virtual event hosted by Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on September 28 and will appear at the 2020 Southern Festival of Books, held online October 1-11.

A Multitude of Elegies

Ayad Akhtar creates a powerful literary assemblage in Homeland Elegies

By Hamilton Cain | September 15, 2020

Ayad Akhtar’s Homeland Elegies is a dazzling, genre-busting book, a work of autofiction with the potential to shock us out of our complacency. Akhtar will discuss the book at the 2020 Southern Festival of Books, held online October 1-11.

Dim Lights, Dark Hallways

In Yaa Gyasi’s Transcendent Kingdom, a neuroscientist tries to makes sense of her family’s unraveling

By Sean Kinch | September 14, 2020

In Yaa Gyasi’s Transcendent Kingdom, Gifty, a first-generation American whose family immigrated from Ghana, learns young that religion cannot explain her family’s misfortunes, so she turns to science for answers. Gyasi will discuss Transcendent Kingdom at the 2020 Southern Festival of Books, held online October 1-11.

Trapped in the Dusk

Erica Waters’ Ghost Wood Song is a suspenseful story about grief, bravery, and growing up

By Bianca Sass | September 11, 2020

In Nashville writer Erica Waters’ debut novel, Ghost Wood Song, a riveting coming-of-age thriller, Shady Grove sets out on a quest to unearth her family’s most sinister secrets so that she can finally lay the past to rest and protect the ones still living. Waters will appear at the 2020 Southern Festival of Books, held online October 1-11.

Hardship as Possibility

Contemporary Appalachian writers profile one another in Step into the Circle

By Emily Choate | September 10, 2020

Step into the Circle brings together Appalachian writers and photographers to profile some of the region’s beloved literary forces. Contributors Silas House, Lee Smith, Jason Kyle Howard, Wiley Cash, and Mallory Cash will appear at the 2020 Southern Festival of Books, held online October 1-11.

Unspoken Prayers

Ashleigh Bryant Phillips weaves a transcendent tapestry of stories in Sleepovers

By Lauren Turner | September 4, 2020

Ashleigh Bryant Phillips’ debut story collection, Sleepovers, is set in the rural northeast corner of North Carolina where she was born and raised. Steeped in the specificities of place, her characters display plainspoken charm and a desperate sense of longing. Phillips will discuss Sleepovers with George Singleton at a virtual event hosted by Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on September 28; will appear at the 2020 Southern Festival of Books, held online October 1-11; and will participate in the Mirror House Reading Series, a virtual event hosted by The Porch in Nashville, on November 11.

Tias and Primas: On Knowing and Loving the Women Who Raise Us

By Prisca Dorcas Mojica Rodríguez, illustrated by Josie Del Castillo
Seal Press
304 pages
$30

“Within these pages, I found my abuela, my tías and my primas — laughing, crying, and nodding alongside me. This book is a gift of understanding, and loving one’s family, even when our families are complicated and painful. It’s a beautiful reminder of the power of storytelling and the profound connection of kinship.”

~ Paola Mendoza, author, organizer and filmmaker