Features | Chapter 16

Report from Chattanooga, Day One

By Maria Browning

April 15, 2011

April 15, 2011 Wandering around downtown Chattanooga Wednesday night, looking forward to the first day of the Conference on Southern Literature, I couldn’t resist stopping to pay my respects at the empty storefront that once housed Rock Point Books. It was a charming little independent bookstore, but its charm was not enough to save it from the downward spiral of the publishing business and the economy in general.

Book Excerpt: Madison Smartt Bell's The Color of Night

By Madison Smartt Bell

February 21, 2011

February 21, 2011 In his new novel, The Color of Night, Madison Smartt Bell takes readers into the mind of Mae, a woman who has channeled the incestuous abuse of her childhood into a mystical, eroticized obsession with violence and death. Televised images of the 9/11 attacks thrill her, spurring memories of a sojourn with a Manson-like cult and of a woman, Laurel, who was her lover and ally there. What follows is an excerpt from the book, which hits shelves April 5.

“Laced with Tyler’s trademark humor, love of pop culture, and arguably too many musical theater references, This Changes Everything is a story about how wrestling with the idea of death can birth a whole new outlook on life, how we live it, and the urgency that comes when you grasp that time is a precious commodity.”

~ the publisher