Chapter 16
A Community of Tennessee Writers, Readers & Passersby

Muse of a Different Sort

Beth Macy chronicles race, greed, and family in another true tale from Virginia

macy_truevineBeth Macy’s Truevine: Two Brothers, a Kidnapping, and a Mother’s Quest: A True Story of the Jim Crow South tells the tale of young African-American boys taken from their sharecropper family in Virginia and made into a circus sideshow that toured the world. Macy will appear at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 14-16. Festival events are free and open to the public.

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Scaling the Empathy Wall

In Strangers in Their Own Land, sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild finds the heart of the political right

strangers_in_their_own_landThrough a close cultural study conducted in Louisiana, sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild sought to explain the deep-seated fears that helped create the current political divide. She will discuss the resulting book, Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 14-16.

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Jefferson Family Values

Annette Gordon-Reed and Peter S. Onuf demystify a founding father

Most Blessed of the Patriarchs_ 9780871404428.inddMost Blessed of the Patriarchs: Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination by Annette Gordon-Reed and Peter S. Onuf explores the ideas, times, and misconceptions about a founding father often described as indecipherable. Gordon-Reed will appear at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 14-16.

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Into the Breach

Adam Hochschild argues that the Spanish Civil War was one of the first great populist causes

spaininourhearts_hiAdam Hochschild’s highly readable new book is not a history of the Spanish Civil War. Though he touches all the highlights—Picasso’s “Guernica,” Hemingway’s tour to the front, George Orwell’s foray into Catalonia—Spain in Our Hearts is a character-driven story. Hochschild will appear at the Southern Festival of Books, held Oct. 14-16 at Legislative Plaza and the Nashville Pubic Library. Festival events are free and open to the public.

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Murder in the Yogurt Shop

A cold case warms up as Beverly Lowry disentangles a web of accusations and false confessions

whokilledthesegirlsBeverly Lowry’s Who Killed These Girls? chronicles the cold case of the Yogurt Shop Murders, from crime to false confessions, that left Austin a changed city. Lowry will appear at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 14-15.

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Beautiful and Haunting Worlds

William Ferris’s latest collection articulates complex feelings about the rural South

ferris-cover-imageThe South in Color: A Visual Journal completes a collection of William Ferris’s visual documentary work about his home state and its complicated racial and cultural history. The esteemed scholar of Southern culture will discuss The South in Color at the Cotton Museum in Memphis on October 8 at 6 p.m., and at the Southern Festival of Books, held in Nashville October 14-16. Festival events are free and open to the public.

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