NewSouth Books is pleased to announce our 2006 holiday book sale, offering a 30% discount on all our titles. Through the end of December, prices for all the titles listed on the NewSouth website have been discounted by 30%. No need for special coupons–the discounts are automatic!

For more information, visit our NewSouth Books Holiday Sale page. And for more discounts, see our full line of titles in our searchable book database.

The NewSouth Books 2006 Holiday Book Sale — it’s a great time to learn more about NewSouth Books.

Author Mark Ethridge offers some notes from the road while he’s been touring with his new book, Grievances:

For several months I’ve been on a tour for my novel, Grievances, which came out in May. I was excited getting into it but I figured that by now–roughly appearance number 40 of 60 or so–it would become tiresome, repetitive.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. At literally every stop, whether bookstore signing or major presentation, I’ve been surprised and delighted by��meeting new and��old friends, by learning some forgotten family history,��by making the acquaintance of other writers, or by just hearing other people’s stories.

An example occurred recently outside of Chapel Hill.

I’d arrived a little early for my talk and signing at McIntyre’s Bookshop and decided to drive by my late grandparents’ spectacular home and grounds overlooking the Rocky River south of town. The roads had changed��since I’d been there last, more than 20 years before, after my grandparents, Mark and Willie Snow Ethridge, had died. Thankfully, my grandmother’s huge but delicate Japanese gate still��made��the entrance unmistakable. I couldn’t resist driving up the long, wooded driveway.

The house was just as it had been when they had lived there. I could see through the floor-to-ceiling glass walls that a grand piano sat right where my grandmother’s had decades before. I decided to knock on the door.

After apologizing for interrupting, I was warmly greeted by a very nice man named Dr. Fred Sparling and his��lovely wife ��Joyce who had owned the house for many years. They knew exactly who I was, still referred to the house as “The Ethridge House” and, in fact had collected stories about my grandparents and the famous visitors they welcomed to the home. Mrs. Sparling even had a shelf of the books written by my grandmother.

We enjoyed a brief but wonderful visit as they showed me the house and we shared stories. I mentioned I hoped the book event wouldn’t last too long because I wanted to get home to listen to football on the Internet.

“What team?” he asked.

“Princeton. My son ��is the class of 2010 and ��plays defensive tackle.”

He stuck out his hand. “Class of 1958.”

Forty-five minutes later, the Sparlings showed up at my book signing. We plan to get together again soon.

Author Mark Ethridge is himself a Class of 1971 graduate from Princeton. His book, Grievances,�� is now�� available�� from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local or online book��retailer.

Anna Olswanger, author of NewSouth’s award-winning Shlemiel Crooks, will be participating in a number of signing engagements throughout November and December. Shlemiel Crooks makes an excellent holiday present, so be sure to stop by and get a copy signed.

Upcoming events with Shlemiel Crooks author Anna Olswanger:

– Book signing and program on “Jewish Stories: Researching, Writing, and Getting Them Published” at Barnes & Noble in Clifton, New Jersey, on Monday, November 20, 8-9 p.m. A benefit for the YBH of Passaic school. Barnes & Noble, 395 Route 3 East, Clifton (973-779-5500).

– Book signing and program on “How to Write Your Family History” at Books, Bytes & Beyond, Glen Rock, New Jersey, on Tuesday, November 28, 7-9 p.m. A benefit for Shalom Baby of UJA Federation of Northern New Jersey. Books, Bytes & Beyond, 197 Rock Road, Glen Rock (201-670-6766).

– Book signing and program on ‚ÄúHow to Write a Jewish Book and get it Published from a Literary Agent’s Point of View‚Äù at Barnes & Noble in Clifton, New Jersey, on Tuesday, December 5, 7:30-9 p.m. Barnes & Noble, 395 Route 3 East, Clifton (973-779-5500).

Shlemiel Crooks is also available directly from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local or online book retailer. Shlemiel Crooks is a Koret International Jewish Book Award Finalist and a Sydney Taylor Honor Book.

Hugo Black of Alabama author Steve Suitts will speak on “A Liberal Tradition: Alabamians in the U.S. Senate from the Great Depression to the Great Society” on Thursday, November 16, from 9:30-11:30 am, at the annual meeting of the Southern Historical Society, in Birmingham. He will also lead at tour group at 4:45, visiting various historical sites in Birmingham pertaining to the life of Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black.

The Southern Historical Association will also offer three other tours, examining historical downtown Birmingham, Birmingham civil rights landmarks, and and the fantastic Birmingham estates. For more information on all of these tours, contact pamking@uab.edu, or visit http://www.uga.edu/~sha/.

Hugo Black of Alabama is available directly from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local or online book retailer. Learn more about Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black at hugoblack.com.

Jacqueline Matte, author of They Say the Wind is Red, had a Letter to the Editor posted in the Birmingham News on October 25, 2006. Matte writes that she is pleased with the paper’s article about Calcedeaver Elementary School as “Gov. Bob Riley’s poster child for Alabama’s Reading Initiative program”; however, she says that the children who attend the school, mostly “poor Native Americans,” should be recognized as part of the Mowa Band of Choctaw Indians, a tribe still seeking to be recognized by the federal government. Matte also mentions an opportunity she had to interact with the children at that school and to speak with them about her book. From her letter:

I was invited by Calcedeaver’s librarian to speak to the students during the school’s “Meet an Author” program. I talked with them about my book (their history) They Say the Wind is Red: The Alabama Choctaws Lost in Their Own Land. At the end of my talk, we had a question-and-answer session. It was wonderful and inspiring.

I do not understand why The News did not identify the “poor Native American” students, but perhaps it has to do with politics. Nonetheless, they deserve the positive publicity.

Read the full article at the Birmingham News.

They Say the Wind is Red is available directly from NewSouth Books, Amazon.com, or your favorite local or online book retailer.

The following comes from This Day in Civil Rights History, written by Ben Beard and NewSouth editor Randall Williams:

On this day in civil rights history, Ku Klux Klansmen and Nazis killed five people in North Carolina, in what would become known as ���the Greensboro Massacre.���

Weeks earlier, the Workers��� Viewpoint Organization had planned an anti-Klan rally to be held in Morningside Homes, a black housing project in Greensboro. In the late 1970s, the WVO, a biracial organization, helped textile unions in North Carolina negotiate better working conditions. The WVO grew out of the civil rights and antiwar movements of the late 1960s as activists sought to continue their work in the post-civil rights era.

Under WVO auspices, poor black and white textile workers built a coalition to improve their situation. On occasion, the KKK threatened the union leaders and, as an act of defiance, the WVO planned a rally against the Klan. The activists were also planning to announce the new name of their organization: the Communist Workers��� Party.

The so-called ���Death to the Klan��� rally was to be a combination social protest, political gathering, and economic declaration. Learning of the event, members of the KKK and the American Nazi Party, both then active in middle North Carolina, planned a competing anticommunism event.

The anti-Klan rally began around 11 a.m. Soon afterwards, carloads of Klansmen and Nazis disrupted the rally. Television news cameras were present, and their film of the incident showed the armed Klansmen and Nazis getting out of their cars and, with guns drawn, approaching the anti-Klan parade, targeting members of the Communist Workers Party and firing point-blank at them. The entire incident lasted only a few minutes. At the end, five leaders of the rally lay dead���Caesar Cauce, Mike Nathan, Sandi Smith, Bill Sampson, and James Waller���with ten injured.
Survivors of the attack alleged a conspiracy, and with good reason. The local police, who were warned of the potential for trouble, were suspiciously absent at the time of the attack. Informants in the Klan had relayed information about the potential attack, but no one had done anything about it. In the subsequent state and then federal trials, however, the murderers were found not guilty on all charges. In a civil trial, the City of Greensboro paid some of the survivors a settlement without admitting any wrongdoing.

The Greensboro Massacre caused a national outrage and led to the formation of the National Anti-Klan Network (later the Center for Democratic Renewal). Some 100 civil rights, church, labor, and community organizations joined in the network. In the summer of 2004, Greensboro launched the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate the incident.

This Day in Civil Rights History is available from your favorite local or online book retailer, directly from NewSouth Books, or from Amazon.com.

Hugo Black of Alabama by Steve Suitts, the award-winning biography of Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, has now been released in Adobe Reader eBook format. Featuring a fully searchable text and hyperlinked index, the electronic release of the book offers a powerful tool for legal scholars, putting the complete history of Justice Black’s life from his youth in Alabama to his time in the US Senate all accessible at the click of a cursor.

Hugo Black of Alabama is available in Adobe Reader format from Powells Books and many other online eBook retailers. To see the full line of NewSouth books available electronically, visit our ebook page.

For more information on Hugo Black of Alabama, visit http://www.newsouthbooks.com/hugoblack.