“Elizabeth Catte is the author What You Are Getting Wrong About Appalachia, a critical look Hillbilly Elegy-fication of politics that uses radical history to challenge perceptions of the region as a hub of white, working-class woe.” What You Are Getting Wrong About Appalachia is a frank assessment of America’s recent fascination with the people and problems of the region. The book analyzes trends in contemporary writing on Appalachia, presents a brief history of Appalachia with an eye toward unpacking Appalachian stereotypes, and provides examples of writing, art, and policy created by Appalachians as opposed to for Appalachians. The book offers a must-needed insider’s perspective on the region.
Robert Gipe, author of the award-winning 2015 illustrated novel “Trampoline,” has just published “Weedeater,” which continues the story of reluctant heroine Dawn Jewell and is the second book in a planned trilogy. Gipe writes, “I wrote “Weedeater” knowing people who live where I do also read books. So I try to write something for them that deals with what is hard, but also catches how much fun we have, and how much spirit for surviving we have, and I try to write books that mess around with ideas about how things could maybe get better. But then I also write books to try and catch what it’s like when a whole bunch of things go wrong at once for readers for whom not so many things have gone wrong.”