Fiction

September 17, 2013 In her third novel, The Funeral Dress, Susan Gregg Gilmore does her finest work to date, perfectly capturing the rhythm and music of small-town Southern life in a quiet story about the ways women support one another when times are tough. Gilmore will discuss The Funeral Dress at Parnassus Books in Nashville on September 24, 2013, at 6:30 p.m., and again at Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on October 6 at 2 p.m.

September 13, 2013 In Michael Farris Smith’s debut novel, Rivers, the world seems to be getting “badder all the time,” and the Gulf Coast is declared uninhabitable. Two years after the final evacuation, Smith sets a small band of characters on the dangerous road North, toward the hope of a new life free from storms. Michael Farris Smith will discuss Rivers at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 11-13, 2013. All festival events are free and open to the public.

September 12, 2013 Amity Gaige’s new novel, Schroder, is a long, strange love letter to the title character’s estranged wife, providing a record of, in his mind, the magical days that ensued when he absconded with their six-year-old daughter, as well as the truth about his identity, which he’s hidden for decades. Amity Gaige will appear at the twenty-fifth annual Southern Festival of Books held in Nashville October 11-13, 2013. All events are free and open to the public.

September 6, 2013 Tara Conklin’s debut novel, The House Girl, revolves around the legacy of Josephine Bell, a long-dead artist who lived as a house slave on a Virginia tobacco farm. By interweaving Josephine’s story with the path of the researcher trying to uncover that buried history, the novel confronts the question of whether it’s ever truly possible to restore what’s been ruptured by time and injustice. Conklin will appear at the twenty-fifth annual Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 11-13, 2013. All festival events are free and open to the public.

September 5, 2013 In Night Film, Marisha Pessl convincingly imagines the duplicitous world of a movie director named Stanislas Cordova, whose infamous films terrorize viewers. In this novel loaded with deception, misperception, and outright terror, the mysterious death of Cordova’s daughter propels a journalist into the dark corners of movies and the human mind. Pessl will appear at the Nashville Public Library at 6:15 p.m. on September 12, 2013, as part of the Salon@615 series.