Michael Farris Smith in Virtual Conversation with Erin Templeton | Nick

Join us on Thursday, June 10th, at 7PM as we connect with Michael Farris Smith to discuss his newest novel, Nick. Erin Templeton from Converse College will be joining him for this virtual event! In Nick, Smith explores the character of Nick Carraway and his life before Gatsby, and Erin Templeton is a Fitzgerald scholar and currently serves on the board of the F. Scott Fitzgerald society. We are looking forward to a great conversation!

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Nick

by Michael Farris Smith

• • •

Before Nick Carraway moved to West Egg and into Gatsby's periphery, he was at the center of a very different story-one taking place along the trenches and deep within the tunnels of World War I.

Floundering in the wake of the destruction he witnessed firsthand, Nick delays his return home, hoping to escape the questions he cannot answer about the horrors of war. Instead, he embarks on a transcontinental redemptive journey that takes him from a whirlwind Paris romance-doomed from the very beginning-to the dizzying frenzy of New Orleans, rife with its own flavor of debauchery and violence.

An epic portrait of a truly singular era and a sweeping, romantic story of self-discovery, this rich and imaginative novel breathes new life into a character that many know but few have pondered deeply. Charged with enough alcohol, heartbreak, and profound yearning to paralyze even the heartiest of golden age scribes, Nick reveals the man behind the narrator who has captivated readers for decades. 

“Anybody who believes that the war is over when the enemy surrenders and the troops come home needs to read Michael Farris Smith’s masterful new novel Nick. Its stark, unvarnished truth will haunt you.”―Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls and Chances Are…

Michael Farris Smith is the author of Blackwood, The Fighter, Desperation Road, Rivers, and The Hands of Strangers. His novels have appeared on Best of the Year lists in Esquire, Southern Living, Book Riot, and numerous other outlets, and have been named Indie Next, Barnes & Noble Discover, and Amazon Best of the Month selections. He has been a finalist for the Southern Book Prize, the Gold Dagger Awardin the UK, and the Grand Prix des Lectricesin France, and his essays have appeared in the New York Times, the Bitter Southerner, Garden & Gun, and more. He lives in Oxford, Mississippi, with his wife and two daughters.

Erin Templeton is the Dean of the College of Humanities, Sciences, and Business *and* a Professor of English at Converse College, where she specializes in 20th and 21st Century American literature. She loves to run. She is a crime fiction junkie, a rabid Steeler fan, a decent fantasy football manager, and can put together a respectable March Madness bracket. For a while, she was a contributing writer for the Chronicle of Higher Education blog ProfHacker. In her spare time, you can find her running and probably listening to an audiobook, walking her dog, feeding a cat or two, or, just maybe, taking a nap.