Book Review: Aftermath Lounge #aftermathlounge
Aftermath Lounge By: Margaret McMullan
This book was nothing like I expected. When I am going to read a book, I don’t like to read anything about it. That way I don’t have any preconceived opinion on it. I knew it was a book about life after hurricane Katrina. What I received is a fabulous book with short stories. Each story follows several different characters and their experiences leading up to and after the storm. This is such a well written book. I could relate to the characters and could truthfully believe the stories. I absolutely recommend this book to fans of contemporary fiction.
Ten years post-Katrina, aftermath stories live on! Acclaimed author and NEA recipient Margaret McMullan explores how people struggle with the ghost of Hurricane Katrina in new story collection.
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina destroyed 95% of the small coastal town of Pass Christian, Mississippi. With a 28-foot storm surge, the highest recorded in U.S. history, 55-foot waves, and winds reaching 120 mph, the town was wiped off the map—temporarily. Award-winning author Margaret McMullan saw the destruction firsthand. Her family’s historic Gulf Coast home—her father’s beloved southern jewel—was one of the houses in Pass Christian devastated by Katrina. Despite the chaos immediately following the storm, McMullan’s family was among the first to rebuild and donated to the Red Cross, the Pass Christian fire station, and the Pass Christian library. During this time, McMullan witnessed small acts of heroism that inspired her to write about the community and its people, and how tragedy shapes our character. In 2010, she was awarded a National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship to complete the project. Born in part out of her family’s deep connection to the community, Aftermath Lounge: A Novel in Stories (April 2015, Calypso Editions) releases at the 10-year anniversary of Katrina and comprises fictional vignettes about the people of Pass Christian in the storm’s wake. The stories are connected by a setting near to the author’s heart—the McMullans’ home, which was originally constructed in 1845 and restored by her father numerous times over the years.Aftermath Lounge is a compelling tribute to the Gulf Coast and resurrects the place and its people alongside their heartaches and triumphs. It is a riveting mosaic that feeds our desire to understand what it means to be alive in this day and age.
Available to buy from…
Amazon.com Barnes & Noble Calypso Editions
About the Author!
Margaret McMullan is the author of six award-winning novels including In My Mother’s House (St. Martin’s Press), Sources of Light (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), Cashay (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), When I Crossed No-Bob (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), and How I Found the Strong (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). Her writing has appeared in The Chicago Tribune, Ploughshares, Southern Accents, TriQuarterly, Michigan Quarterly Review,The Sun, and many other publications.She received an NEA Fellowship in literature for Aftermath Lounge and a Fulbright award to teach at the University of Pécs in Pécs, Hungary, for her upcoming non-fiction work, Where the Angels Live. Her anthology of essays by 25 well-known female authors writing about their fathers, Every Father’s Daughter (McPherson & Company), is also available in Spring 2015. She currently holds the Melvin Peterson Endowed Chair in Creative Writing at the University of Evansville in Indiana.
Find the author on the following sites…
Margaret McMullan Website and Twitter
Author Tour!
April 9, 7pm – Honey Lounge , Minneapolis, MN ~ April 16, 4pm – Melvin Peterson Gallery, Evansville, IN
April 18, 2pm – B&N, Evansville, IN ~ April 24, 5pm – Pass Christian Books, MS
April 25, 1pm – Lemuria Books, Jackson, MS ~ April 30 – May 2 – Kentucky Book Festival
May 1 – Blue Marble Books, Ft. Thomas, KY ~ May 3 – WordTheatre, Burbank , CA
May 7, 5pm – Planters Coffeehouse, Henderson, KY ~ May 13, 7pm – Malaprops Bookstore, Ashville, NC
May 15-17 – South Carolina Book Festival ~ May 23 – Indy Reads Books, Indianapolis, IN
June 5, 5pm – Lake Forest Book Store, Lake Forest, IL ~ June 5-8 – Printer’s Row Book Festival, Chicago, IL
June 3, 6pm – Chicago Public Library, Chicago, IL ~ June 15, 6:30pm – Parnassus Books, Nashville, TN
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I used to read so much more, but now it seems all my spare time goes to my blog! Hurricane Katrina is something I will never forget though, because we were driving cross-country to move at that time. Every night in the hotel when we stopped driving, we turned on CNN, and we couldn’t believe what we were seeing. We moved for my husband’s job transfer, and Mississippi was one of the places he could have gone. We were glad, of course, that he didn’t take that option.
My favorite genre’ in reading are true stories. There is not much said after terrible tragedies like hurricane Katrina. I am glad someone wrote a book to follow up on those afflicted.