WYPL Book Talk

Michael Farris Smith - Rivers

Stephen Usery interviews Michael Farris Smith about his new novel, Rivers. It's the story of a man named Cohen trying to survive the Mississippi Gulf coast in the near future where climate change has brought an endless succession of hurricanes to the area. The Federal government has declared the area a no-man's land where services or assistance will be not provided.

Jesmyn Ward - Men We Reaped

Stephen Usery welcomes National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward back to the program. They will be discussing her new memoir, Men We Reaped, the story not only of her life but also the deaths of five young African-American men close to her family in rural southern Mississippi, including her only brother.

Jolina Petersheim - The Outcast

 
Stephen Usery interviews Jolina Petersheim about her debut novel, The Outcast: A Modern Retelling of The Scarlett Letter. Set in contemporary Tennessee, The Outcast in question is Rachel Stoltzfus a young woman with a baby recently born out wedlock who has been made unwelcome in her Old Order Mennonite community and must find her way among the outside world they call The English.

John Dufresne - No Regrets, Coyote

John Dufresne is a Guggenheim fellow, playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. His first two novels, Louisiana Power and Light and Love Warps the Mind a Little were named New York Times notable books of the year. He's now trying his hand at crime fiction with No Regrets, Coyote, the story of middle-aged therapist Wylie Melville who gets caught up in in a tough situation when he's called into consult on a murder case on Christmas Eve down in south Florida.

Kiese Laymon - Long Division

 

Stephen Usery interviews Jackson, Mississippi native and Vassar College professor Kiese Laymon about his two new books. Long Division is the story of contemporary Jackson teenager named City Coldson, who finds a novel starring a teen from the 1980s with his same name. How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America is a collection of unflinching essays which examine race and class in America and how it often fails to live up to its promise of liberty and justice for all.

Eric Barnes - Something Pretty, Something Beautiful

 

Stephen Usery interviews Eric Barnes. Eric is the publisher of three newspapers: The Daily News, The Memphis News, and The Nashville Ledger. He's written short stories which have appeared in many fine journals such as Prairie Schooner and The Literary Review. 2009 saw his first novel publication with Shimmer, and Outpost19 has recently published Something Pretty, Something Beautiful.

Elaine Hussey - The Sweetest Hallelujah

 

Elaine Hussey is a new name on the southern literary fiction scene, although the woman behind that name, Peggy Webb, has published dozens of  romance, suspense, and mystery novels. Her new novel inspired her to take on a new pen name. The Sweetest Hallelujah is set in Tupelo, Mississippi in the 1950s, which becomes the meeting ground for women from different races and backgrounds to plan for the care of a young girl.

Matthew Guinn - The Resurrectionist

Stephen Usery interviews Matthew Guinn about his debut novel, The Resurrectionist, about a slave in the 1850s ordered to steal other slaves' corpses for dissection for a South Carolina medical school, as well as a 1990s doctor who learns of the story which jeopardizes his school's reputation.

Susan Crandall - Whistling Past the Graveyard

Susan Crandall has published ten novels, including Magnolia Sky. and Seeing Red. Gallery Books has published her historical novel, Whistling Past the Graveyard, a story about a young, runaway white girl named Starla who becomes attached to a black woman named Eula, and their uneasy journey through Jim Crow landscape of Mississippi in the early 1960s.

Michael Harvey - The Innocence game

Michael Harvey is the co-creator and producer of the hit A&E television show Cold Case Files. He has earned a law degree, teaches at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. He also writes crime novels. He's published four starring the former Chicago cop and current PI Michael Kelly, and Knopf has recent published a standalone thriller which marries his love of journalism and criminal law in The Innocence Game.

David Berg - Run Brother, Run

David Berg is one of the most feared and respected trial attorneys in America. His brother Alan Berg was murdered in the spring of 1968. Charles Harrelson, the father of actor Woody Harrelson, was tried for the murder. David has recently published  Run, Brother, Run: A Memoir of Murder in My Family which looks at David's tumultuous family history leading up to the time of Alan's death, and the effect it and the subsequent trial had on him and his family.

Scott Phillips - Rake

Scott Phillips is probably best known for his debut novel, The Ice Harvest, which was made into a film with John Cusak and Billy Bob Thornton.Counterpoint has just released his novel Rake, the story of an American soap opera actor who gets in over his head when he tries to make a movie in Paris.

Cathie Pelletier - The One-Way Bridge

 

 
Stephen Usery welcomes Cathie Pelletier to the program. She's written ten novels,  five of which are set in the fictional town of Mattagash,  Maine. In the new book, The One-Way Bridge, mailman Orville Craft and Vietnam vet Harry Plunkett butt heads as almost the entire town begins to feel unhappy with their relationships in this humorous and heartbreaking portrait of a small town on the Canadian border.

William Hustwit - James J Kilpatrick: Salesman for Segregation

Sara Hoover interviews historian William P. Hustwit about his book, James J. Kilpatrick: Salesman for Segregation. Kilpatrick was a controversial newspaper editor and syndicated columnist who attempted to use intellectual arguments for maintaining the unfair and racist Jim Crow laws of the South. He was also a key figure in turning southern conservatives toward the Republican Party in the 1960s and 70s.

Beth Hoffman - Looking for Me

Linda Lloyd interviews New York Times bestselling Author Beth Hoffman about her new novel, Looking For Me. Teddi Overman has left her native Kentucky to get involved with the antiques trade in Charleston, South Carolina. However, she returns home in hopes of finding her estranged and missing brother Josh, while confronting difficult memories in her family's past.

Ace Atkins - The Broken Places

Stephen Usery welcomes Ace Atkins back to the program this week to discuss The Broken Places, the third installment of the Quinn Colson series. Former Army Ranger turned Mississippi county sheriff, Colson is suspicious of his sister's ex-con preacher boyfriend, while some Parchman Prison escapees are lurking in the background.

John Scalzi - The Human Division

Stephen Usery interviews John Scalzi about his new novel, The Human Division, the fifth book in his Old Man's War series. Humankind is in danger because it has angered almost every other species in our corner of the universe. A not-ready-for-prime-time diplomatic squad, known as "The B Team", is thrown into difficult situation after difficult situation and succeeds because of clever thinking instead of shooting first and asking questions later.

Wayne Drash - On These Courts

 
We welcome back Sara Hoover as one of our guest hosts this week as she talks with Wayne B. Drash. Wayne is a veteran journalist and web producer for cnn.com and grew up for a while in Memphis.  His debut book is On These Courts: A Miracle Season That Changed a City, a Once-Future Star, and a Team Forever.  It's the story of Memphian and NBA superstar Anfernee "Penny" Hardaway and how he helped his friend Desmond Merriweather coach the Lester Middle School basketball team to a championship and the impact it had on their Binghampton community.

Richard Paul Evans - A Step of Faith

Stephen Usery interviews Richard Paul Evans about the fourth installment of his The Walk series. In A Step of Faith, former advertising executive Alan Christofferson is continuing his walk from Seattle to Key West, which he began after the death of his wife and losing his firm. He starts off in Saint Louis, makes his way to Georgia, including a stop at Graceland, and meets the kind and sometimes bizarre people who make up our country.

Clyde Edgerton - Pappadaddy's Guide for New Fathers

 

Stephen Usery welcomes Clyde Edgerton back to the program. Known for his often humorous novels, Clyde is now branching out into the field of paternal advice with Papadaddy's Book for New Fathers: Advice to Dads of All Ages. Clyde draws on his experience with his four children, three of whom came along in his late fifties. He even sings a little song that he wrote for his kids.