A Publication of Humanities Tennessee

Children & YA

The Language of the Heart

By Tina LoTufo

July 22, 2013 “I was an eleven-year-old kid standing on a street corner in Memphis in short pants,” observes the narrator of Vince Vawter’s Paperboy. “I felt like I was so small that I would be blown away if the slightest puff of wind came up. But you didn’t have to worry about any kind of a breeze showing up on a late July afternoon in Memphis.” Paperboy is a rare treat: a gentle coming-of-age story that manages to be smart, funny, poignant, and original—the perfect marriage of style and substance—with a narrative voice that rings true. Vawter will appear at the twenty-fifth annual Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 11-13. All festival events are free and open to the public.

A Nashville Cross of the Knight

By Margaret Renkl

July 12, 2013 Even before Between Shades of Gray hit shelves, it was obvious that Ruta Sepetys’s debut novel was about to take the literary world by storm. Earning four starred reviews—one from every pre-publication review site in the country—is practically unheard of, even for veteran novelists. Between Shades of Gray, pronounced Kirkus, “deserves the widest possible readership.”

The Way He Works

By Susannah Felts

May 14, 2013 Twenty-five years ago and long B.G. (before Google), illustrator and writer David Macaulay published his groundbreaking book, The Way Things Work, now a classic of educational children’s literature. In 2008, he published a follow-up of sorts, The Way We Work, which applied his innovative and meticulous show-and-tell approach to the human body. Truly an artist for all ages, Macaulay has received both the Caldecott Medal and a MacArthur genius grant. On May 18 at 2 p.m., he’ll deliver the commencement address to the 2013 graduating class of Watkins College of Art, Design & Film in Nashville. The event, which will be held at the Downtown Presbyterian Church, is free and open to the public.

The Way He Works

Great Stories Live Here

By Tina LoTufo

May 6, 2013 “Being Southern is something you just are,” novelist Elizabeth Spencer said at last month’s Celebration of Southern Literature: “I couldn’t turn it off if I tried. And I never tried.” Held April 18-20 in Chattanooga and sponsored by the Southern Lit Alliance (formerly the Arts & Education Council), this year’s gathering—the seventeenth biennial—included participation by more than twenty-five members of the Fellowship, who handed out ten awards for fiction, poetry, non-fiction, and drama, including the Cleanth Brooks Medal for Lifetime Achievement to Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Beth Henley.

Found in Translation

By Susannah Felts

April 25, 2013 While many illustrated children’s books are collaborative efforts, few involve an international partnership quite like the one that resulted in Jemmy Button, a beautiful new work by Nashville illustrator Jennifer Uman and Italian illustrator Valerio Vidali. Their creation, based on a fascinating true story from the annals of Victorian-era exploration and colonialism, looks at the ways in which linguistic and cultural boundaries and identities can—and can’t—be breached or dismantled. But it also tells a story of estrangement, homesickness, and a journey across the sea that should engage young children and adult readers alike.

Found in Translation

Finding Solace

By Bradley Hartsell

April 24, 2013 In the Internet era with its unceasing news cycle, athletes tend to speak in platitudes and PR statements, but memoirist R.A. Dickey, the Toronto Blue Jays’ new knuckleball pitcher, has never resorted to trite or banal responses in interviews. Since the publication of his memoir, Wherever I Wind Up (newly released in both paperback and a young-readers’ edition called Throwing Strikes),

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