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Author Interview: Janie Dempsey Watts on ‘Return to Taylor’s Crossing’

  Chattanooga native Janie Dempsey Watts joins us to discuss her new novel Return to Taylor’s Crossing, which explores the lingering effects of racism and violence during the Civil Rights era in North Georgia.  The novel was published in 2015.  Her debut novel, Moon Over Taylor’s Ridgewas published in 2012.

Return to Taylor’s Crossing was the Winner of First Place in the 2015 Knoxville Writers’ Guild Literary Contest, Novel Excerpt, and it was also a Semi-finalist in the 2015 William Faulkner—William Wisdom Creative Writing Competiton.

Here’s the publisher’s description:

Summer, 1959. In a small Georgia town, dairy worker Abednego Harris, 19, not only stands out for his skillful handling of bulls, but because of his color. When Lola James, 17, arrives to do day work for a nearby family, Abednego is smitten. As the young couple falls in love, racial tensions heat up, threatening their world. A violent attack tears them apart and spins their lives in different directions. This is their story, and the story of four others whose lives are forever changed by violence. One of them will return to Taylor’s Crossing seeking answers.   

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