Latest News
E. Patrick Johnson takes Sweet Tea on Tour
E. Patrick Johnson began his tour for Sweet Tea: Black Gay Men of the South with end of August appearances at Atlanta's Outwrite Books and the Decatur Book Festival. In September, he'll appear at Giovanni's Room in Philadelphia, at the Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and at Durham's Regulator Bookshop.
Publishers Weekly says that "This fascinating . . . oral history subverts countless preconceptions in its illustration of black gay subcultures thriving in just about every imaginable rural and religious milieu in the South. . . . The courage and honesty of Johnson's interviewees humble, and readers will find much to treasure in the stories." The book is also a Nota Bene selection of The Chronicle of Higher Education
More August News
On September 13, Peter Cozzens, author of Shenandoah 1862: Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign, will have a virtual book signing at Chicago's Abraham Lincoln Book Shop. Three other UNC Press authors have had virtual events there, including Rod Andrew, author of Wade Hampton: Confederate Warrior to Southern Redeemer, Gary Gallagher, author of Causes Won, Lost, and Forgotten: How Hollywood and Popular Art Shape What We Know about the Civil War and Russell McClintock, author of Lincoln and the Decision for War: The Northern Response to Secession. Visit the Abraham Lincoln Book Shop for more information on virtual book signings.
Dr. Nortin Hadler, author of Worried Sick: A Prescription for Health in an Overtreated America , recently brought his eye-opening message to radio with an interview on XM's "Dr. Oz's Oprah & Friends". He is slated to be on "Reach MD" in September and on Joe and Terry Graedon's "The People's Pharmacy" on October 25.
Worried Sickwas recently featured in the Science Times section of The New York Times. The book, already in its second printing, has received enthusiastic reviews from The New England Journal of Medicine, Library Journal, and Foreword Magazine.
Congratulations to Anthony E. Kaye, whose book Joining Places: Slave Neighborhoods in the Old South is a finalist for the 2008 Frederick Douglass Prize. The award, from Yale University's Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition and sponsored by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, is one of the most coveted awards for the study of the African-American experience. The award is named for Frederick Douglass (1818-1895), the one-time slave who escaped bondage to emerge as one of the great American abolitionists, reformers, writers, and orators of the nineteenth century. The prize winner will be announced in September.
"Hotter and slicker than a politician's handshake at a pig pickin' in July." That's how Raleigh News and Observer reviewer Marcy Smith described Rob Christensen's Paradox of Tar Heel Politics: The Personalities, Elections, and Events That Shaped Modern North Carolina, in a roundup of summer reading picks. The book has won acclaim from newspapers around the state, including the Charlotte Observer, which calls Christensen "a keen observer and first-rate storyteller" and the Greensboro News and Record, which calls the book "A romp through 100 years of North Carolina politics."
Cesar Miguel Rondon, author of The Book of Salsa: A Chronicle of Urban Music from the Caribbean to New York City, appeared at Books and Books in Coral Gables, FL on July 31 for a talk that was simulcast on Unionradio.net. The book's availability in English has been a cause for celebration by the likes of Latin Beat and The Descarga Review, that called the book "A must-have for all salsa aficionados."
Southern Living recently announced the release of The North Carolina Birding Trail: Coastal Plain Trail Guide and The Piedmont Trail Guide, both of which promise to "lead both amateur and experienced birdwatchers through the high-flying terrain of North Carolina." Watch for The Mountains Trail Guide, available by the summer of 2009.
The Wall Street Journal said that Rod Andrew's Wade Hampton: Confederate Warrior to Southern Redeemer "describes Hampton's wartime experience with special vividness" and The Washington Times notes that "Andrew has succeeded in producing a Hampton biography that is not only definitive, but also entertaining."
Michael Taube reviewed Gary Gallagher's Causes Won, Lost, and Forgotten: How Hollywood and Popular Art Shape What We Know about the Civil War, in The Weekly Standard, calling it "A superb analysis of a war that defined a nation—but that has lost its definition thanks to liberal amounts of creative license afforded to the celluloid and pen-and-ink crowds."
Nell Wise Wechter's beloved classic Taffy of Torpedo Junction is being introduced to a new generation of readers through serialization in the "Newspapers in Education" program. The book tells the thrilling story of a young girl who, with the help of her pony and dog, exposes a ring of Nazi spies operating in Hatteras Island, North Carolina, during World War II. Learn more about Taffy and hear an audio clip from the book.
It's hurricane season! Visit hurricane historian Jay Barnes's website.
