Explosive Revelations
In Dynamite Nashville, Betsy Phillips plunges into the world of white supremacist violence in Nashville during the civil rights era. Phillips will discuss the book at the Tennessee State Museum on July 13.
2024 Southern Festival of Books
Memphis Noir
Ace Atkins, known for his Quinn Colson novels, has crafted a classic detective tale in Don’t Let the Devil Ride, an international thriller solidly anchored in Memphis. Atkins will appear at Novel in Memphis on June 26 and in an online discussion with Chapter 16’s Michael Ray Taylor on July 16.
Tender and Tragic
Coming to terms with guns or learning to knit a scarf, Andre Dubus III’s contradictions make for compelling reading in Ghost Dogs.
Forging an Autonomous Path
Ann Powers’ Traveling: On the Path of Joni Mitchell weaves research, reportage, and analysis to tell the iconic singer-songwriter’s story in a conversational way. Powers will appear at Parnassus Books in Nashville on June 12.
This World of Broken Sins
In Henry Wise’s debut novel Holy City, a tormented police officer investigates a murder that digs up secrets the county would rather keep buried. Wise will appear at Novel in Memphis on June 2.
Loving Country
The music scene in Nashville is tricky and hard to describe until you figure out how obsessed the city is with the relationship between conformity and rebellion. Brian Fairbanks provides plenty of detail about the full-cylinder lives of country music iconoclasts Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Willie Nelson, and Waylon Jennings in Willie, Waylon, and the Boys: How Nashville Outsiders Changed Country Music Forever.
