Joe Epley recently was elected to Board of Directors of the Military Writers Society of America.  The MWSA has around 700 members around the country. Details on the website: http://www.mwsadispatches.com.  ; The organization's purpose is to help military service members, veterans, their families, supporters of the military,and historians record history and the complexities of military life--and encourage writing as therapy. The…

Author of key book of our times comes to Asheville

Andrea Wulf makes Malaprop's Bookstore one her stops, Sun., May 1, 5 p.m., in talking…

The 8^th Annual Blue Ridge Bookfest brings authors to Flat Rock

There are a few oases where writers congregate to share wares and wisdom, and Apr. 22-23, the place is Blue Ridge Community College, featuring 19 readings and workshops, and many more opportunities for conversations with authors at exhibition tables.  See full schedule at…

Yesterday, on the Ides of March, my book, Forests, Alligators, Battlefields: My Journey through the National Parks of the South, was officially launched – a soft launch.

It’s now available on Amazon in both…

Many thanks to Edge Magazine for publishing this excerpt "Wear the Right Garb" from Plant Whatever Brings You Joy in their March issue! http://www.edgemagazine.net/2016/03/wear-the-right-garb/ Copies of my book are available at Malaprop's! xoxo

Dennis Covington's Revelation

Dennis Covington, author of Salvation on Sand Mountain, has a new book out: Revelation: A Search for Faith in a Violent Religious World, for which he visited "places where people are subject to extremity."   As Jesus instructed, he says, he is a witness to suffering in a search for holiness.

Covington presents his book at…

2016 Randall Jarrell Poetry Competition

Tuesday, March 1, the submission window closes. 

The Randall Jarrell Poetry Competition accepts one-poem submissions. The contest awards the winner $200 and publication in "storySouth." The final judge is Sarah Rose Nordgren, author of the poetry collection "Best Bones" (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2014), which was selected by Ed…

VANCE SCHOOL

What I remember the most about Vance Elementary School in West Asheville , NC is the color red. I could remember lots of other things about my first school. It was at Vance that I said my first curse word. Also, I got into my first fight, saw my first professional yo yo performance and was caught breaking into the concession stand. I learned a lot at Vance. I learned that there are good teachers and not so good teachers. I learned that the world is inhabited by…

“Unveiling Our Treasures” program

Pauline Johnson and Roman Blevins present "North Carolina History:  From the Archives to the Classroom,” based on their research in the Southern Appalachian Archives, at the Liston B. Ramsey Center for Regional Studies, Thurs., February 18^th at 3 p.m. , Mars Hill University. 

The…

Key Appalachian studies publications now going online

from press release, Jan. 27. 2016 

Appalachian studies scholars and those interested in regional history will have greater access to out-of-print works thanks to a two-year National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Open Book Program grant totaling $88,000 awarded to Belk Library and Information Commons at Appalachian State University.…

Two articles leapt at my consciousness this week, both about writing. And suddenly, I know how to go forward from here.



The first, The Price I Pay to Write, by Laura Bogart and published online…

Black Mountain College artist--from obscurity to rediscovery

Ray Spillenger: Rediscovery of a Black Mountain Painter

Exhibition: January 22, 2016 – May 21, 2016

Opening Reception: Friday, January 22 from 5:30 - 8:00 p.m., FREE Admission

Curated by Dr. Theodore E. Stebbins Jr., Curator of American Art, Emeritus, Harvard Art Museums

Gallery talk by the curator at 6:45 p.m., January 22, 2016

See…

Writer's Workshop Poetry Contest  

26th ANNUAL POETRY CONTEST

The Writers' Workshop of Asheville is sponsoring its 26^th Annual Poetry Contest, open to any writer regardless of residence. The deadline is: postmarked or emailed by Feb. 28, 2016. Mail…

Fire and Ice Roses has been interviewing gardening bloggers and gardening experts and were kind enough to include this short interview recently which was quite fun and very much appreciated! http://fireandiceroses.com/ask-an-expert-kathryn-hall/

History in the making: items of note, January 2, 2016

It was reported in today’s print edition of the Asheville Citizen-Times that a new state law went into effect, requiring people who’ve filed for unemployment benefits to make at least 5 job contacts a week.  It had been 2.  How will that work?  Are there that many jobs for which a person is qualified?  Can you apply to the same job twice if it continues to be…

Tarantino, eminent domain, and emancipation 

Tarantino comes to town

Quentin Tarantino’s New Year’s gore and gabfest, The Hateful Eight, is gutted by New Yorker reviewer Anthony Lane, who says that Tarantino toys with rather than explores history, using it “for boyish fantasies of revenge, as if enormous crimes could be undone, after the event, by lone and wanton acts of humiliation.” …

Spring 2016 will be great for our region’s literature

Ron Rash publishes Poems: New and Selected, Mar. 15.  The author of Serena is one of the country’s great poets and short story writers.  Selections from all four previous books of poems are included; as are eight new poems, one of which speaks the mind of a female country singer, “somewhere on a bus between/ Baton Rouge and New Orleans.”

Lee…

Genetic science fiction comes true

The New York Times (Nov. 19, 2015) reported that a genetically altered salmon has been created, and it grows twice as quickly a regular salmon.  It’s called AquAdvantage.  (See…

Latest issue of the Appalachian Journal focuses on Appalachian music

from press release

The Appalachian Journal has published its first special edition on Appalachian music. This double issue (vol. 42, nos. 3-4) is the largest one in the journal’s 42-year history, with 300-plus pages and 60-plus contributors. 

Guest editors Mark Freed and Trevor McKenzie are both musicians and music teachers who…