Living in the Present with John Prine, Tom Piazza’s poignant book about the late singer-songwriter, is full of colorful anecdotes about the time the two men spent together — a painfully short interlude of friendship that ended abruptly with Prine’s death in the spring of 2020. Tom Piazza will appear at the 2025 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville, October 18-19.
In his memoir House of Smoke, Southern food writer and cultural commentator John T. Edge turns the spotlight on himself, seeking to understand his personal history and evolution. Edge will appear at The Rosecomb in Chattanooga on September 18, Union Ave. Books in Knoxville on October 16, the 2025 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville on October on 18-19, Novel in Memphis on October 22, and Parnassus Books in Nashville on October 27.
In Dead Center: In Defense of Common Sense, Joe Manchin describes how he rose to political power as a Democrat, then quit the party when he felt it no longer reflected his values. The book is a political memoir that passionately warns his fellow Americans of the dangers of putting party ahead of country. He will discuss Dead Center in a conversation with Brad Paisley at Vanderbilt University on September 17.
In The Shape of Wonder scientists Alan Lightman and Martin Rees attempt to counter the growing mistrust of scientific institutions around the world by helping readers “understand scientists as people and what they actually do, how they think, work, and live.”
The Wounds Are the Witness by Yolanda Pierce, dean of Vanderbilt Divinity School, serves as devotional reading, a summons to self-care, and encouragement for everyday action and outspokenness. Dr. Pierce will appear at the 2025 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville, October 18-19.
In The Black Family Who Built America: The McKissacks, Two Centuries of Daring Pioneers, Cheryl McKissack Daniel chronicles her family’s emergence from artisanal construction work as enslaved laborers to prominence as architects and builders with a Nashville-based company. She will appear at the 2025 Southern Festival of Books in Nashville, October 18-19.
