Memphis Magazine profiles Sailing to Alluvium author John Pritchard
Lush images and equally evocative writing mark a new profile of writer John Pritchard in Memphis Magazine, by Michael Flanagan with photographs by Brandon Dill. Flanagan, who knew Pritchard from when Flanagan was a student and Pritchard an English professor, let Pritchard take him on an intimate tour of the Mississippi Delta as only Pritchard could conjure; the Delta is also the setting of Pritchard’s first two acclaimed books, Junior Ray and The Yazoo Blues, and his new book forthcoming from NewSouth in October, Sailing to Alluvium …
Wright brothers scholar Julie Williams responds to Connecticut “first in flight” controversy
Julie Williams, author of Wings of Opportunity: The Wright Brothers in Montgomery, Alabama, 1910, writes: “The state of Connecticut has just declared local hero Gustave Whitehead to be the inventor of the airplane, claiming Whitehead flew in 1901, before the Wright Brothers first flew in 1903. Claims like this occasionally crop up, because many people were trying to invent the airplane around the time of the Wright Brothers. Wilbur Wright himself, inspired by their efforts, resolved to make his mark on the world by inventing the airplane. The key element is that he and his brother Orville actually did it, while others did not …”
Rheta Grimsley Johnson inspired by Frye Gaillard’s Books That Mattered
Two NewSouth Books authors came together recently when syndicated columnist Rheta Grimsley Johnson (Hank Hung the Moon, 2012) attended writer Frye Gaillard’s April 10 event at Eclipse Coffee and Books in Montevallo, Alabama. Gaillard was there to talk about his new book The Books That Mattered: A Reader’s Memoir. Johnson, writing about the event and the book in her recent column “The Books That Rocked Your World,” said that “in writing compellingly about some of his favorite books and authors, the ones that moved and shaped him, Gaillard has produced another book that matters” …
Skip Tucker talks Pale Blue Light with Publishers Weekly, Shelf Awareness
Over author Skip Tucker’s 1,500-mile book tour through Virginia, Atlanta, and New Orleans, he met a lot of readers interested in his unique Civil War spy thriller Pale Blue Light. Tucker spoke with Publishers Weekly and Shelf Awareness about his trip …
Gerald Duff’s Dirty Rice named ForeWord Best of the Year finalist
Earlier this month, NewSouth released award-winning author Gerald Duff’s novel Coasters and his short story collection Fire Ants as ebooks, along with individual ebooks of each of Fire Ants‘ fifteen stories, and Duff’s new short essay Fugitive Days. But these are just a few of Duff’s books receiving praise from all corners …
Gerald Duff’s Fire Ants short stories released as individual ebooks
Publishers Weekly has praised Gerald Duff’s fiction for “wit and subtlety as simply satisfying as a tall cold one on a hot Gulf Coast afternoon.” Now Duff’s short story collection Fire Ants and Other Stories is available as an ebook, and each story is also available as their own individual $0.99 ebook …
Close encounters with Robert Penn Warren, Fugitive poets in Gerald Duff’s Fugitive Days
In his new ebook Fugitive Days, writer and professor Gerald Duff recalls his chance encounters with such literary figures as Robert Penn Warren, John Crowe Ransom, Allen Tate, and Andrew Lytle. In his meetings with the poets, Duff finds the humanity in each — some approachable, some remote, some lost in the wilds of age or overshadowed by their own legends. Duff and his readers take away with them new understanding of what writers-as-fugitives gain and sacrifices in pursuit of their craft …
Bloggers, reviewers praise middle-grade Holocaust novel Greenhorn
“Greenhorn is the perfect tool for parents and educators to introduce younger children to the Holocaust,” writes Robert Kent of the Middle Grade Ninja blog, joining a host of reviewers across the blogosphere praising Anna Olswanger’s new middle-grade novel. Mallory Heart Reviews calls Greenhorn “heartwrenching and heartwarming” …
Rare Titanic author Julie Williams ponders sailing Clive Palmer’s Titanic II
A tempting vacation or tempting fate? That’s the debate about Australian billionaire Clive Palmer’s plans to build a new Titanic, replicating the original, to sail in 2016. USA Today spoke about the new Titanic with Julie Williams, author of A Rare Titanic Family, which chronicles the experiences of her uncle and his family on the doomed ship …
Remembering former UA law school dean Daniel Meador
Daniel Meador, former dean of the University of Alabama Law School and author most recently of The Transformative Years of the University of Alabama Law School: 1966-1970, died February 9 at age 86 …