Books N Blues is upon us again.
If you don't know about the event, then you must have been stuck under a rock last year, or you're new to the community.
Welcome.
This is a fund-raiser for Communities in Schools, but it's oh, so much more than the usual fund-raiser. See, this one includes books and music.
Ready?
It begins at noon Friday at Turnrow Book Co. with a reading and signing by Edward P. Jones. Jones won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005 for "The Known World." He's been a professor of writing at various universities, including Princeton. He has a collection of short stories out, "All Aunt Hagar's Children," which is a must-read.
Also at Turnrow Books at 5 p.m. you'll get to see two more authors, Darden North, a Jackson-based obstetrician/gynecologist, who wrote "Points of Origin" in his spare time while waiting on babies to get ready to come into the world. North grew up just a few miles up the road in Cleveland. He is the son of Evelyn Hays North and the late Linton Darden North.
Appearing at the same time will be Helen DeFrance, co-author of "At Home Cafe." Many people know DeFrance from her series of classes for children, called Kids are Cooking, held at Everyday Gourmet in Jackson and in other locations.
At 7 p.m. Friday, Turnrow Books will host former Gov. William Winter, author of "The Measure of Our Days," which has just been published by the University of Mississippi Press. Winter has emerged as an advocate for education and racial reconciliation and is responsible for Mississippi's Renaissance during his administration, 1980-84.
If you're into historical fiction, you don't want to miss Janis Cooke Newman, who will join Gov. Winter for the Friday evening session. Newman has written "Mary, a Novel" - a historical novel about Mary Todd Lincoln.
In an interview published in the Noe Valley Voice, San Francisco, Newman said she felt like a "defender" of Lincoln, who was regarded as crazy by most people, - even her son, Robert, who had her locked away after his father's assassination.
Sid Selvidge will provide some music Friday - some of the blues portion of the program. Selvidge is a native of Greenville. It's said that he received his first guitar at age 13 and began working it in the style of Furry Lewis and Mississippi Fred McDowell.
The last entry on his discography is "Live at the Otherlands" from Memphis, Tenn. The release prior, "A Little Bit of Rain," earned accolades from "Rolling Stone" magazine as "… a precious treasure." We can vouch for that.
The literary portion of the festival continues 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Turnrow with a children's story time and book signing with Chuck Galey, illustrator of "Rock and Roll Dogs."
Galey was born right here in Greenwood, although he lives in Jackson now. He has illustrated more than 50 books for educational publishers around the country.
He's created covers for two of Beverly Cleary's youth novels, including "Ribsy" and "Henry Huggins."
The grownups get a real treat at 1 p.m. Saturday when Greenwood native and author Mary Carol Miller teams with Robert Dalby, author of "Waltzing at the Piggly Wiggly," to lead a panel discussion for aspiring writers.
Most of you know Miller. She's a frequent coffee drinker at Turnrow. She's also author of several books, including "Lost Landmarks of Mississippi," "Lost Mansions of Mississippi," "Written in the Bricks" and "Great Houses of Mississippi."
Miller has teamed with a Jackson native, Mary Rose Carter, who now lives in Greenwood.
Carter photographs Miller's subjects. She has illustrated "Written in the Bricks" and "Great Houses of Mississippi."
"Waltzing at the Piggly Wiggly" is Dalby's first published book. It's a good tale of life in the Mississippi Delta.
At 3 p.m. at Turnrow, a panel of local authors will read and sign their books about Delta stories. Those on the panel will include Keetha DePriest Reed, A.L. Harris, Opal Turner Brown, to name a few.
Reed is the author of two books on Southern food and culture, "Culinary Kudzu" and "More Culinary Kudzu."
Harris is a poet, whose book "My Mentality," has received welcomed attention. She's a 1999 graduate of Amanda Elzy High School who always has loved reading and writing. At her mother's suggestion, A.L. Harris wrote her first short story, titled "The Adventures of Charlie & Toni." After losing those stories during a move, A.L. Harris turned to poetry and began keeping accurate records (which goes back to 1996).
Brown has written "Against the Darkness of the Night," a story of a woman's struggle during the Civil War. Forbes called it "heartwarming."
Then, Saturday night, get ready for the big party that begins at 6 p.m. at the Viking Training Center, 111 Front St.
It's food and drink and lots of items to bid on, all for $25 per person. For the second year, the gracious Myrna Colley-Lee has chaired the committee that has put together this two-day event.
Colley-Lee is well-known in national theater circles as a costume designer. Her most recent work includes productions such as "The Wedding Band," for the Steppenwolf Theatre; "Night of the Iguana" for the Alabama Shakespeare Festival; "Love Langston: for the Seattle Repertory Theatre and "Fences" with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, among others.
She also has been costume designer, art director and set designer for film and television productions. She has held faculty or staff positions in design at Smith College, The Kennedy Center's American College Theater Festival and at the Design and Management Institute of the National Arts Consortium in New York. Outside the theater she is a commissioner for the Mississippi Arts Commission and is on the boards of Charleston Arts Revitalization Effort, a civic organization, and also the Rock River Foundation, a philanthropic organization for the arts.
