:: books & games archives
Spirit of a City
by Sarah Litvin
September 3, 2008
“A Season of the Night: New Orleans Life After Katrina” (University Press of Mississippi, 2008, $25) is the effervescent tribute of a New Orleans transplant to his adopted home. Ian McNulty sensitively writes a heart-felt, though at times overly sentimental,…
The Duke of Gonzo
by Jesse Yancy
August 20, 2008
What author would you like to have over to your house? Vonnegut, Hemingway, Angelou? Thanks to the University Press of Mississippi’s Literary Conversations Series, the question is no longer moot, and you don’t even have to make dinner.
Steven Wells Hicks: Writing For Sock Monkeys
by Ward Schaefer
August 6, 2008
Steven Wells Hicks was a creative advertising director for 35 years before becoming a novelist. Born in Omaha, Neb., Hicks has lived in Jackson since July, 1974 and calls himself a “southerner by choice.” He self-published his debut novel, “The…
The Beginning
by Lauren Beattie
July 30, 2008
The Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, a state agency that spied on the activities of civil rights supporters, was what first led Eric Etheridge to the haunting mug shots of the Freedom Riders in 2004. As a native of Carthage, Etheridge shares…
Man v. Flesh
by Cheree Franco
July 30, 2008
Andre Dubus III’s “Garden of the Last Days” (W. W. Norton, 2008, $24.95) is a brick of a book. At 500-plus pages, it’s America on parade: g-strings and neon, alcohol and testosterone, easy cash, patriotism and dumb sentiment. Once launched,…
Romance and Fly-fishing
by Greg Williamson
July 9, 2008
Fly-fishing combines the joy of being outside with the gracefulness of casting a line so light that it takes multiple flicks of the wrist to keep it aloft until that moment when you let it lay out so softly that…
Reprehensible Rogues
by Lindsey Maddox
July 2, 2008
One approaches a Chuck Palahniuk novel with a certain set of expectations. The author of “Fight Club” (which led to a blockbuster film) and the critically acclaimed “Survivor,” Palahniuk commonly employs violence, sexuality and profanity in his novels, while his…
The Southerner’s Plate
by Jesse Yancy
June 23, 2008
After the first edition publication of the Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, C. Vann Woodward suggested that the work deserved expansion. This affirmation confirmed what the editors knew already, that their initial effort, an 8-pound tome published in 1989, merely scratched…
Postcard to the Future
by Sarah Litvin
June 11, 2008
With a skinny tie and sassafras root ‘round his neck, Seth Ballard Sr., the last of the Mississippi Herb Doctors, looks out serenely from a photograph on page 37. On page 55, a waitress in a starched white dress smirks…
No Safety Here
by Cheree Franco
June 4, 2008
I wanted to like this book. I wanted to like this book about sticky Louisiana summers, lifelong friendships, severe Southern mamas and the vapid allure of Los Angeles. I wanted to like this book because, superficially at least, “The Safety…
Sweet Home Mississippi
by Lindsey Maddox
May 28, 2008
A Mississippi childhood influences people in a variety of ways, both similar and different. It’s no surprise that “Growing up in Mississippi,” (University of Mississippi Press, 2008, $25), an edited short story collection of tales and reflections from famous Mississippians…
What Is A Life?
by Sarah Christine Bolton
May 21, 2008
The beginning of Gina B. Nahai’s “Caspian Rain” (MacAdam Cage, 2007, $25) is almost fairy tale-like, sighing with promise and expectation: “She’s sixteen years old—a young woman in a city with blue mountains.” A young Jewish girl growing up…
Intertwined Paths
by Jere Nash
May 14, 2008
At some point in the research I did for the book of Mississippi political history that Andy Taggart and I wrote, it dawned on me that two of Mississippi’s most famous political figures, two of the most diametrically opposite people you could ever hope to find, Sen. Jim Eastland and civil-rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer, were neighbors in Sunflower County. What a great idea for a book, I thought! Then Chris Myers Asch beat me to the publishing finish line. Turns out he was already writing a doctoral dissertation on the subject. Now it’s a book that has just been published, “The Senator and the Sharecropper: The Freedom Struggles of James O. Eastland and Fannie Lou Hamer “ (New York: The New Press, 2008, $27.95). Not so good for my writing plans, but very good news for the reading public.
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The Entrepreneurial Poor
by Lindsey Maddox
May 9, 2008
“If you go out into the real world, you cannot miss seeing that the poor are poor not because they are untrained or illiterate but because they cannot retain the returns of their labor,” writes Muhammed Yunus in his narrative…
We All Watch Oprah
by Brandi Herrera Pfrehm
April 30, 2008
Juan Felipe Herrera is one of the preeminent voices in 20th-century Chicano poetry. Since the early 1970s, he’s devoted his multimedia work to challenging the notions of what it is to be a Mexican American. His poetry and prose is both provocative and experimental, possessing a drive that can only come from the revolutionist’s heart. And Herrera’s heart is devoted to busting traditional literary forms out of their tightly synched seams, giving voice to a people so often left voiceless by American culture and its insular tendencies.
::recent comments
Sep 02, 2008Disaster: A Growth Industry
Walt: I bought the book Ronni. I haven't read it yet though.
Sep 02, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
Ronni M: Michael, Problem, reaction, solution is one thing; problems redefined as capitalist opportunities, solved by tearing out the guts of the very…
Sep 01, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
ladd: I have no idea what your first sentence is supposed to mean, but no matter.
Otherwise, it seems like…
Sep 01, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
Striker: @ladd, I wasn't going to bother answering this, but a 2nd nuisance e told me "enuf"! So I've unchecked the Notify box.
Sep 01, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
ladd: How do you know if you haven't read it, Striker?
Actually, Naomi Klein has an impressive track record with…
Sep 01, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
Striker: Another altruist on a campaign. Mostly opinion presented as fact. Not on my list.
Aug 31, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
Michael Harvill: This looks to be an amazingly educational read. Some have another phrase for it - Problem - Reaction - Solution.
Aug 29, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
gwilly: I haven't read the book but your review, Ronni, makes it sound like a must read. While I am not ready to…
Aug 28, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
Ronni M: Walt, surreal is an excellent description. This book is scary, mostly because it makes such good sense. You might not agree…
Aug 28, 2008
Disaster: A Growth Industry
Walt: I gotta buy and read this, too. Sounds surreal, though!