Southern-based novelists F. Rutledge Hammes (author of A Curious Matter of Men with Wings), Melissa Ginsburg (Sunset City), Chris Offutt (Country Dark), Brian Panowich (Bull Mountain), and moderator Ellen Malphrus (Untying the Moon) will discuss the sometimes dark, sometimes empowering themes of family and friendship that unify their respective works. These writers will also explore in conversation with one another the power of fiction to reveal to us understanding about our connections to those closest to us. A book signing will follow with the panelists.

About A Curious Matter of Men with Wings by F. Rutledge Hammes

Two troubled brothers, one a dreamer and one a rebel, search for their missing sister after she mysteriously disappears in coastal Carolina.

About Sunset City by Melissa Ginsburg

“A web of darkness and sunlight traversed by one of the most memorable heroines of recent years, Sunset City suffuses Charlotte Ford’s journey with a lyricism and yearning that elevates its genre; bruised and heartbroken and sharp as a band saw, with a sense of place so real you feel the heatwaves off the asphalt. An exciting debut by a crime writer with real heart and wisdom and the language to carry it.”—Nic Pizzolatto, author of Galveston and creator of HBO’s True Detective

About Country Dark by Chris Offutt

“It’s been nearly 20 years since Offutt’s Out of the Woods (1999), and his return to fiction will be celebrated by all readers of country noir . . . Tucker is a true existential hero, facing his circumscribed world directly and acting with unflinching determination. His story, like the work of Daniel Woodrell, is both heartrendingly painful and unsentimentally uplifting.” ―Booklist

About Bull Mountain by Brian Panowich

“[Panowich storms] onto the scene with an epic southern tale that establishes him as a new voice for southern writers…. An unabashed literary page-turner, Bull Mountain, takes readers along for a ride full of well-timed twists and turns, and the shocking family secret that causes the inevitable climax…. one of the best multi-generational family sagas in years.”—Huffington Post

About Untying the Moon by Ellen Malphrus

“Rare are those works that breathe and exhale a Southern air with a naturalness neither contrived nor necessarily even conscious. Lowcountry poet Ellen Malphrus has gifted the reader… [with this in] her debut novel, Untying the Moon. and its mesmeric, bafflingly honest, and frustratingly contradictory center, Bailey Martin.”—Charleston (S.C.) Post & Courier

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This session is also included in the festival’s Weekend Pass and Saturday Pass.(Multi-session passes include free and ticketed events excluding workshops, cooking demonstrations, and tours).

For more information about the multi-session passes, please click here…