To Celebrate Being Alive
In Dailiness: Essays on Poetry, Mark Jarman considers canonical and contemporary writers while reflecting on the kinship of prayers and poems.
Book Reviews
Scrappy Survivors
Staten Island Stories, the debut story collection from Vanderbilt M.F.A. grad Claire Jimenez, depicts the diverse lives of the forgotten borough. Jimenez and poet Cara Dees will discuss their work at Vanderbilt University in Nashville on March 20.
The Not-So-Open Road
In Overground Railroad, Candacy Taylor conjures the menacing byways and backwaters black Americans traveled in the era of Jim Crow — and the revolutionary guide that lit their way. Taylor will appear at Parnassus Books in Nashville on February 17 and at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis on February 27.
Down From the Mountain
In Beyond the Sunset: The Melungeon Outdoor Drama, 1969-1976, Wayne Winkler explores how Tennessee’s poorest county turned to an unlikely source for economic revival: an outdoor drama about the region’s Melungeon heritage. The play ran for just five seasons but changed the county’s view of its mixed-race neighbors forever.
Fake It Till You Make It
In Greg Howard’s second middle-grade novel, Middle School’s a Drag: You Better Werk!, entrepreneurial pre-teen Mikey Pruitt thinks his new talent agency can’t miss, now that he’s representing an eighth-grade aspiring drag queen. Readers won’t be surprised to find out that things don’t go as smoothly as Mikey anticipates. Howard will discuss the book at Parnassus Books in Nashville on February 11, at Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on February 13, and at the SE-YA Book Fest in Murfreesboro on March 12-14.
Pitching for a Level Field
Gish Jen’s fifth novel, The Resisters, imagines a world where the poor struggle to survive on houseboats buffeted by swollen seas, the rich live comfortably on high ground, and a young woman’s talent for baseball can lead to revolution. Gish Jen will appear in conversation with Ann Patchett to discuss The Resisters at Parnassus Books in Nashville on February 12.
