Fiction | Chapter 16

Sex and the City

Bill Loehfelm’s third novel, set in a seamy corner of Staten Island, is disturbing, dirty—and irresistible

By Liz Garrigan | June 14, 2011

June 14, 2011 Maureen Coughlin—an underdog oppressed by her own low ambition and everyone else’s belief that she’ll never accomplish anything beyond waiting tables—sees something that was never meant for her eyes: either a homoerotic encounter between unlikely lovers, or an only vaguely consensual act meant to satisfy a debt. By the time the answer becomes clear, the 29-year-old protagonist has found herself involved in a murder investigation whose chief suspect is rich, powerful, and a shoo-in for the U.S. Senate. Bill Loehfelm’s The Devil She Knows is a consuming thriller that has it all: sex, politics, class warfare, and an unlikely hero impossible not to root for. Loehfelm will sign books at 6 p.m. on June 14 at The Booksellers at Laurelwood in Memphis.

Round Two

On the cusp of publishing his second book in a year, Adam Ross talks with Chapter 16 about women, men, and life since Mr. Peanut

By Margaret Renkl | June 9, 2011

June 9, 2011 Last June, Adam Ross’s debut novel, Mr. Peanut, inspired critical assessments like “ingenious,” “brilliant,” “riveting,” “audacious,” “arresting,” “forceful,” “involving,” “stirring,” “original,” “harrowing,” “bleakly convincing,” “unflinching,” and “mesmerizing.” A year later, the Nashville author is back with Ladies and Gentlemen, a new collection of short stories. Due on shelves June 28, it considers many of the same questions raised in Mr. Peanut: the human temptation to cruelty, the simultaneously redemptive and damning nature of passion, the difficulty in forging an integrated and identifiable self from disparate and sometimes self-contradictory impulses and desires. Today Ross offers Chapter 16 readers a sneak peak at the collection and answers questions about the book.

Book Excerpt: Adam Ross’s Ladies and Gentlemen

With the opening pages of “Middlemen,” Adam Ross gives Chapter 16 readers an early look at his forthcoming story collection

By Adam Ross | June 9, 2011

June 9, 2011 In the fall of 1980, my parents enrolled me in seventh grade at the Trinity School—a tony, Episcopal private school in Manhattan that was all boys until ninth grade. So my two best new friends, Abe Herman and Kyle Duckworth, were thirteen- year- olds on the cusp of, among other things, coeducation.

Book Excerpt: Adam Ross's Ladies and Gentlemen

With the opening pages of “Middlemen,” Adam Ross gives Chapter 16 readers an early look at his forthcoming story collection

By Adam Ross | June 9, 2011

Another Novel, At Long Last

Thanks to Silas House, James Still’s last book has finally come to print

By Pablo Tanguay | May 30, 2011

May 31, 2011 James Still’s final manuscript, penned over the last fifteen years of his life and with him in the hospital room when he died a decade ago, has finally been published. Edited by Silas House, Chinaberry is a moving, gorgeously written coming-of-age novel and a fine capstone to the career of one of Appalachia’s most influential writers.

Karma Isn't Quick Enough

In Lorraine López’s new novel, a host of hangers-on defeats all Gandhian goals of patience and forgiveness

By Susannah Felts | May 24, 2011

May 24, 2011 For Marina Lucero, as for Sartre, hell is other people. Try as she might, Marina, heroine of Lorraine López’s new novel, The Realm of Hungry Spirits, can’t seem to wrench free of the gravitational pull of her family and friends. While she feels a kinship with the teachings of the Dalai Lama and Gandhi, her loved ones constantly challenge her efforts at greater compassion—sometimes with comic results.

I Gotta Sing!

By Alice Faye Duncan
WaterBrook
40 pages
$14.99

“A whole barnyard makes noise ‘in the Spirit of joy’ throughout this raucous picture book, a sweetly heartwarming sing-along by Duncan. Kellam conveys comfort and happiness as the loved ones reflect sunny enthusiasm in this gladdening rendition of the Black American religious folk song ‘I’m Goin’a Sing When the Spirit Says Sing.’”

~Publishers Weekly