In American Bacon: The History of a Food Phenomenon, Mark A. Johnson examines the complicated 400-year history of what some argue is America’s favorite food — and all the cultural baggage it carries. Johnson will discuss American Bacon at Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on April 16.
Patrick Radden Keefe turns his investigative powers to the death of a young con artist in his sixth book, London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family’s Search for Truth. What begins as an inquiry into a 19-year-old man’s possible murder quickly evolves into what Keefe is best known for: a bedrock-deep exhumation of some bad people’s biggest secrets. Keefe will discuss London Falling at Parnassus Books in Nashville on April 11.
Jeremy Lloyd, an educator at Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont, writes about the many forms of sustenance to be found in the natural world in Forest Time: Footnotes to an Outdoor Education. Lloyd will appear at Tree Fest Knoxville on April 24, Flock Beer & Wine in Knoxville on April 28, and Neighborly Books in Maryville on May 6.
In Nashville’s New Americans, Sheri Sellmeyer profiles more than 30 first-generation immigrants from all over the world, describing the many ways they enrich the life and culture of the city. Sellmeyer will discuss the book at the Tennessee State Museum in Nashville on April 11.
“There is a lot of human frailty floating around,” observes Nancy Lemann in The Ritz of the Bayou, her account of the 1985 racketeering trial of Edwin Edwards, Louisiana’s colorful, crooked governor. Lemann’s sharp eye for the human frailty at work within a veritable circus of corruption earned the little-known book enduring respect from Lemann’s fans. Hub City Press makes The Ritz of the Bayou available to a new audience with a 40th anniversary edition that includes an introduction by critic James Wolcott and a new afterword by the author.
David George Haskell’s How Flowers Made Our World: The Story of Nature’s Revolutionaries provides a fascinating glimpse into the evolution of all life on Earth (including us) by focusing on one small, beautiful aspect of it. Haskell will speak at Sewanee: The University of the South on March 25, Warner Parks Nature Center in Nashville on March 26, and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga on March 27. He’ll deliver the keynote address for Trails and Trilliums in Beersheba Springs on April 11.
