What books recently rocked my world: The Anthologist, by Nicholson Baker Year of Our Lord, by T. R. Pearson and Langdon Clay . Best damn event(s) we’ve hosted: In 2003, after Laura Bush canceled a White House poetry symposium, we held a huge event featuring 11 poets including Julia Alvarez, Galway Kinnell, and Jay Parini.Continue reading
Today we have the story “House Tour” from Lee Smith‘s most recent collection, Mrs. Darcy and the Blue-Eyed Stranger. In this brilliant gem of a story, a woman is completely unaware that her house is part of a Christmas House Tour. Smith was inspired by a similar experience, when she became an inadvertent participant inContinue reading
Today we have the story “House Tour” from Lee Smith‘s most recent collection, Mrs. Darcy and the Blue-Eyed Stranger. In this brilliant gem of a story, a woman is completely unaware that her house is part of a Christmas House Tour. Smith was inspired by a similar experience, when she became an inadvertent participant inContinue reading
Quail Ridge is the major independent bookstore in Raleigh, NC–hometown of David and Amy Sedaris. It was voted the Best Bookstore of the Year by Publishers Weekly about a decade ago, and rightly so–you can’t enter it without feeling dazzled and buying at least a handful of books. Seriously. Just try. Nancy Olson, owner ofContinue reading
The Triangle area of North Carolina—Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill—is famous for a lot of things: stellar restaurants (three of which made Gourmet‘s most recent Top 50 Restaurants list), musicians (Ben Folds, Ryan Adams, Mitch Easter, James Taylor, The Connells, Squirrel Nut Zippers), authors (David Sedaris, Amy Sedaris, Lee Smith, Charles Frazier, Allan Gurganus, Kaye Gibbons,Continue reading
Last Saturday I attended Lee Smith‘s reading at Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill, NC. Turns out, even on a Saturday night, Smith can draw quite a crowd–and she didn’t disappoint. She read from her new short-story collection, Mrs. Darcy and the Blue-Eyed Stranger (no relation to Jane Austen fan fiction, sorry), but it was moreContinue reading