Short Takes

The Washington Post Book World calls Glenn T. Eskew's JOHNNY MERCER a "smart and meticulously researched biography."

In its thorough review of JOHNNY MERCER, the Wall Street Journal pays particular attention to Mercer's musical accomplishments while highlighting Mercer's upbringing and relationships:

Mr. Eskew doesn't dwell on Mercer's personal life, but he gets it right when he observes discreetly that "the years of emotional abuse left the Mercers devoted to each other and to alcohol in a co-dependency neither could shake." Although JOHNNY MERCER: SOUTHERN SONGWRITER FOR THE WORLD is ponderous at times, it does justice to the giant accomplishments of the "pixie from Dixie."

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution compiles a list of "some suggested favorites for the next six months" and includes Kate Sweeney's forthcoming AMERICAN AFTERLIFE. AMERICAN AFTERLIFE is "a funny, edifying American road trip that bears witness to our most revealing and eccentric funerary customs."

Naming Kate Sweeney as one of the "20 People to Watch in 2014," Creative Loafing praises Sweeney's "enthusiasm" and calls AMERICAN AFTERLIFE "an entertaining read."

Martin Rubin reviews THE MILITARY AND THE MONARCHY for the Washington Times. THE MILITARY AND THE MONARCHY is published by the University Press of North Georgia and distributed by UGA Press.

When the royal baby, Prince George of Cambridge, was baptized on Oct. 23 in the Chapel Royal of St. James' Palace in the heart of London, few thought back to the baptism of another Prince George of Cambridge, his first cousin seven times removed, nearly two centuries ago. Yet as this new book by West Point history professor Kevin W. Farrell makes clear, that far-off figure was not only a fascinating character, but also played an important role as commander in chief of the British army for nearly 40 years, from 1856 to 1895.

Author of the forthcoming BREAKING GROUND: MY LIFE IN MEDICINE, Dr. Louis W. Sullivan, will be speaking at an event honoring the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. on Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2014. He will address Tuskegee University at 11 a.m. CST in the University Chapel for the institution’s annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday Observance. Former secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Sullivan is also the founding dean and former president of The School of Medicine at Morehouse College in Atlanta.

Goodreads Book Giveaway #2

We're giving away advance reader copies of PIRATES YOU DON'T KNOW, AND OTHER ADVENTURES IN THE EXAMINED LIFE! To enter, click on the "Enter to win" button below or look under the giveaways section on Goodreads. Winners will be selected in mid-February. Good luck!

A gorgeous and profound look at life, death, transience, toil, class, and family.

For nearly ten years, John Griswold has been publishing his essays in Inside Higher Ed, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Brevity, Ninth Letter, and Adjunct Advocate, many under the pen name Oronte Churm. His new book, PIRATES YOU DON’T KNOW AND OTHER ADVENTURES IN THE EXAMINED LIFE is a funny, poignant, bittersweet, and sometimes snarky account of everything ranging from creative writing to babies, and from race issues in a university town to crocodiles.

Griswold’s tongue-in-cheek tone allows him to discuss this breadth of subject matter in an inviting and entertaining way while still addressing prevalent and important issues. With humor, pathos, and poignancy, he touches on his upbringing in a coal town in southern Illinois, how class in America affected four generations of his family, his experience as an army deep-sea diver and frogman, the joys and challenges of fatherhood, and what it means to be literate and open to the world. 

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Pirates You Don't Know, and Other Adventures in the Examined Life

by John Griswold

Giveaway ends February 10, 2014.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Spring 2014 Sneak Peek 6

University of Georgia Press is pleased to announce the forthcoming publication of John Griswold’s new book, PIRATES YOU DON’T KNOW AND OTHER ADVENTURES IN THE EXAMINED LIFE. It is a funny, poignant, bittersweet, and sometimes snarky account of everything ranging from creative writing to babies, and from race issues in a university town to crocodiles. The book is scheduled for publication on March 15, 2014.

For nearly ten years, John Griswold has been publishing his essays in Inside Higher Ed, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Brevity, Ninth Letter, and Adjunct Advocate, many under the pen name Oronte Churm. Churm’s topics have ranged widely—from the writing life and the utility of creative writing classes, to race issues in a university town, to the beautiful, protective crocodiles that lie patiently waiting in the minds of fathers. PIRATES YOU DON’T KNOW is Griswold’s vital attempt at making sense of his life as a writer and now-professor. The answers for him are both comic and profound: “Picture Long John Silver at the end of the movie, his dory filled with stolen gold, rowing and sinking; rowing, sinking, and gloating."

Though Griswold recently entered the tenure stream, much of his experience, at a Big 10 university, has been as an adjunct lecturer—that tenuous and uncertain position so many now occupy in higher education. In PIRATES YOU DON’T KNOW, Griswold writes poignantly and hilariously about the contingent nature of this life, tying it to his birth in the last American enclave in Saigon during the Vietnam War, his upbringing in a coal town in southern Illinois, and his experience as an army deep-sea diver and frogman. He investigates class in America through four generations of his family and portrays the continuing joys and challenges of fatherhood while making a living, becoming literate, and staying open to the world. But Griswold’s central concerns apply to everyone: What does it mean to be educated? What does it mean to think, feel, create, and be whole? What is the point of this particular journey?

Bob Shacochis, author of The Woman Who Lost Her Soul, says, “I generally feel indifference for books about writing by writers or anybody. But this one I unabashedly love, embrace, scribble in, underline, copy, quote out loud to my wife. I say without reservation, John Griswold is one of the best essayists inhabiting this land.”

John Griswold is an assistant professor in the MFA program at McNeese State University and the editor of The McNeese Review. He is the author of the novel A Democracy of Ghosts and of the narrative nonfiction Herrin: The Brief History of an Infamous American City. He lives in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Including McNeese State University, he has taught college-level creative writing, literature, and rhetoric for 16 years at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and the University of Miami. Also, Griswold was the first blogger for Inside Higher Ed and has had the blog, The Education of Oronte Churm, for 7 years. Check out the blog here.

Short Takes

Buzzfeed selects Tom Kealey's THIEVES I'VE KNOWN as one of the "17 Books We Loved in 2013." "In his hauntingly beautiful short story collection, Kealey unveils each of the lives of his young characters like a flower, and shows their capacity for survival."

Publishers Weekly reviews Kate Sweeney's forthcoming AMERICAN AFTERLIFE:

As radio reporter and producer Sweeney notes in this unsettling, compassionate volume on American mourning customs, death was once a ubiquitous part of American life; the Victorians raised mourning to an art form. . . . Her stories originate mostly in the South, but have universal relevance. Sweeney writes with a deft touch and with empathy for mourners, whose stories she relays with clarity and care.

Calvin Trillin's "Tamales on the Delta" article in the most recent issue of the New Yorker gives a shout-out to Susan Puckett's EAT DRINK DELTA. Recapping last year's second annual Delta Hot Tamale Festival in Greenville, MS, Trillin comments on a regional food specialties panel he attended. "Susan Puckett, the author of EAT DRINK DELTA, mentioned another favorite of the region we were in—Kool-Aid pickles." Trillin is the author of AN EDUCATION IN GEORGIA (available from UGA Press), which focuses on the integration of the University of Georgia. "[This book] comes closer to the essential social truths of the problem than do some works of greater scope. . . . Trillin brings to the task a greater knowledge of his subjects than most reporters. . . .This knowledge is reinforced by a keen eye, a sensitive ear and respect for fact."—New York Times Book Review

The Nashua Telegraph selects EAT DRINK DELTA as one of the notable cookbooks and culinary reads for 2013.

This is hearty Southern cooking; there is plenty of sugar and butter. But the amounts seem below the norm and few of the recipes involve deep-fat frying. Try, for instance, Chef Charlotte Skelton’s traditional Delta-style chicken salad, built around poached and shredded chicken breasts, or Kathleen Claiborne’s hot cakes with (and this is heretical for New Englanders) orange syrup.

Poets.org featured Cynthia Lowen's poem "Manifest Destiny" on December 27 for the Poem-A-Day program. Check out the poem here. Lowen is the author of THE CLOUD THAT CONTAINED THE LIGHTNING.

KGGN 890AM interviewed John Edgar Tidwell and Carmaletta Williams about their new book, MY DEAR BOY, on December 18. Listen to the interview here.

The Florida Times-Union interviewed Jingle Davis about her book, ISLAND TIME, and her decision to move back to St. Simons Island. Here's an excerpt from the article:

In talking about the island, she said, “It’s vanishing, St. Simons along with the rest of vanishing Georgia. It happens on the coast. It’s popular, people want to live there.”

She notes that once people get to St. Simons Island, they get protective.

It’s funny how that works. People moving to the island don’t ask how many trees were bulldozed to build the house they bought, but they don’t want any more touched.

The book doesn’t have everything, she is certain of that, but she said, “I seem to have put enough in to recognize the place that was there when we were little.”

Asked why she decided to move back to her house on the island, Jingle gives the stock answer.

“I guess I’ve got sand between my toes,” she said.

Maybe, but she’s also seen the marsh turn gold an hour before a winter sunset, had the sea fog condense in tiny beads on her hair, felt the afternoon sea breeze cool a stifling summer day and seen a beam from the lighthouse reach across the still, dark sound.

"ALABAMA GETAWAY is an essential read for anyone who wants to understand contemporary American politics."—Southern Cultures

The January issue of Carolina Arts highlights Andrea Feeser's RED, WHITE, AND BLACK MAKE BLUE. The magazine is available for viewing and/or downloading here.

Brian Craig Miller, author of the forthcoming EMPTY SLEEVES: AMPUTATION IN THE CIVIL WAR SOUTH (2015), has a piece on Major General John Bell Hood for the New York Times' Disunion blog. Hood was one of many during the Civil War whose injury led to the loss of a limb. EMPTY SLEEVES will be the fifth book in the UnCivil Wars series.

Congrats to Michele Gillespie, Paul M. Pressly, and Karen A. Weyler! Their books, KATHARINE AND R.J. REYNOLDS, ON THE RIM OF THE CARIBBEAN, and EMPOWERING WORDS, were chosen as Outstanding Academic Titles by Choice magazine.

Congratulations to Frank X Walker! His book, TURN ME LOOSE, made three best poetry books of 2013 lists: Tinhouse, Slate.com and Split This Rock.