{"id":1280,"date":"2018-12-31T16:32:59","date_gmt":"2018-12-31T16:32:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/?p=1280"},"modified":"2018-12-31T16:32:59","modified_gmt":"2018-12-31T16:32:59","slug":"texas-readsglenn-dromgoole-31","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/?p=1280","title":{"rendered":"Texas ReadsGlenn Dromgoole"},"content":{"rendered":"
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<\/span><\/span><\/span>Texas Reads<\/span>Glenn Dromgoole<\/span><\/h1>\n<\/div>\n

>> archive<\/a><\/span><\/h1>\n

New Jodi Thomas novel debuts this week<\/h1>\n

Amarillo author Jodi Thomas\u2019s new standalone romance,<\/span> Mornings on Main<\/span><\/a><\/span> set in the fictional town of Laurel Springs, Texas, officially goes on sale Tuesday (HQN, $15.99 paperback).<\/p>\n

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Jillian James is always on the move, searching for clues to her peripatetic past. She lands in small town of Laurel Springs, where she plans to stay a few weeks and maybe learn something about the father who raised her and then abruptly abandoned her.<\/p>\n

Needing a job, she meets the town mayor and news blogger, Connor Larady, who has deep roots in Laurel Springs, where he has his hands full trying to care for an aging grandmother and a rebellious teen-age daughter while managing his family\u2019s extensive property holdings. He hires Jillian to help curate and close the grandmother\u2019s quilt job before she sinks completely into dementia.<\/p>\n

As a friendship develops between Jillian and Connor, and then blossoms into a full-blown romance, Jillian makes it clear that in spite of her attraction to him, she will be moving on. She always does. She doesn\u2019t plant roots anywhere.<\/p>\n

Connor, meanwhile, would love to be footloose and see the world, but he can\u2019t very well just take off and forsake his responsibilities as head of the Larady family and mayor of the town.<\/p>\n

Thomas creates a cast of likeable characters (and a few not so likeable) in this upbeat tale about life in a small Texas town.<\/p>\n

Next up for Jodi Thomas: Mistletoe Miracles, the seventh book in her Ransom Canyon series, scheduled for release Sept. 25.<\/p>\n

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Aggie Muster: <\/span>April 21, San Jacinto Day, is a very special day to Texas Aggies. It\u2019s kind of like a worldwide reunion when Aggies get together wherever they are and celebrate Aggie Muster.<\/p>\n

They reminisce about their days at Texas A&M and usually hear a speech, maybe listen to a recitation of a poem called \u201cThe Last Corps Trip,\u201d sing \u201cThe Spirit of Aggieland.\u201d But the highlight of the day is the roll call of the absent.<\/p>\n

As the names are read of those Aggies who have died in the past year, someone in the audience answers \u201cHere\u201d for them. The roll call is followed by the playing of \u201cTaps.\u201d It\u2019s quite moving.<\/p>\n

Muster is held in hundreds of locations, wherever two or more Aggies can gather. It was even held on Corregidor in 1942 before the island fell to the Japanese.<\/p>\n

But the largest Muster is the one held on the Texas A&M campus. It always features a Muster address by a prominent Aggie or someone close to A&M.<\/p>\n

Jerry Cooper \u201963,<\/span> longtime former editor of the A&M alumni magazine, has put together a collection of those speeches in \u201cHere\u201d: The Muster Speeches at Texas A&M University<\/span><\/a><\/span> (Texas A&M University Press, $40 hardcover, 550 pages).<\/p>\n

Cooper introduces each speaker and in a few cases has to summarize the speech if it wasn\u2019t recorded. But most have been recorded, and Cooper lets the speeches speak for themselves.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere\u201d<\/span> is a volume that Aggies everywhere will cherish \u2014 perhaps as the companion to an earlier book, Softly Call the Muster: The Evolution of a Texas Aggie Tradition<\/span> by John A. Adams Jr. \u201973<\/span> (TAMU Press, 1994).<\/p>\n

* * * * *<\/p>\n

Glenn Dromgoole \u201966,<\/span>, author of Aggie Savvy,<\/span> writes about Texas books and authors. Contact him at g.dromgoole@suddenlink.net.<\/p>\n

>> <\/span>Check out his previous Texas Reads columns in Lone Star Lit<\/a><\/span>erary Life<\/span><\/h1>\n

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<\/span><\/span>2018 TEXAS BOOKISH DESTINATIONS<\/h1>\n

Can you name this literary place in the Lone Star State?<\/h1>\n

Admit it: bookfans love traveling almost as much as they love reading itself.<\/span> Beginning March 4, 2018, Lone Star Literary Life will roll out #10 through #6 in our annual list of Top Texas Bookish Destinations, for readers who want to visit the settings of their favorite books, the birthplaces and haunts of favorite authors, and hot spots for book buying, readings, and other literary activity.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But throughout Texas\u2019s 268,597 square miles, there are also lots of out-of-the-way points of interest that we don\u2019t always have space to cover in our Top Ten pages.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Watch this space each week for a new bookish place that you\u2019ll want to add to your own travel list. Be the first to email us with the correct identification, and win a prize!<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This week, we continue with a bookish place that\u2019s located in 2017\u2019s #2 Top Bookish Destination. There\u2019s plenty of poetry in this literary-rich city, but there\u2019s a Poet Tree, too. Can you name the city? And extra credit for telling our readers the neighborhood or street where they can find it, too.<\/p>\n

Email us at<\/span> info@LoneStarLiterary.com<\/span><\/a><\/span> with the specific right answer,<\/span> and we’ll send you a free copy of Literary Texas.<\/span><\/p>\n

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LAST MONTH\u2019S PHOTO<\/span> (below<\/span>) was correctly identified as the Capitol Gift Shop, inside the state capitol building in Austin. Congratulations \u2014 your prize is on the way!<\/p>\n

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Alfred A. Knopf<\/p>\n

Hardcover, 978-0-5255-2010-4, (also available as an e-book, on Audible, and as a large-print paperback), 368 pgs., $27.95<\/p>\n

April 17, 2018<\/p>\n

In a former life, I was a paralegal for an international law firm in Dallas.<\/span> During a conversation with a lawyer from Philadelphia, he told me something astonishing. According to him, neither does Pennsylvania require years of state history in school curriculum, nor do automobile manufacturers create Pennsylvania-edition SUVs. He\u2019d never experienced anything like the Texas identity juggernaut and wanted me to explain it. I\u2019m going to send him an email recommending Lawrence Wright\u2019s<\/span> new book.<\/p>\n

Wright focuses his razor-sharp lens inward and on his home state in God Save Texas: A Journey into the Soul of the Lone Star State.<\/span> Austinite Wright is a staff writer for The New Yorker, playwright, screenwriter, novelist, and author of ten books of nonfiction, including Pulitzer Prize winner The Looming Tower<\/span> (Alfred A. Knopf, 2006). God Save Texas<\/span> is history lesson, cultural criticism, reporting, and memoir. By turns funny and fond, disgusted and resigned, Wright defaults to weary exasperation, but he can\u2019t deny that only Texas feels like home.\u00a0 >>READ MORE<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Philomel Books<\/p>\n

Hardcover, 978-1-5247-4167-9 (also available as an e-book and on Audible), 304 pgs., $18.99<\/p>\n

February 27, 2018<\/p>\n

\u201cTo know a person\u2019s story is inevitably to understand their humanity and feel a loving kinship with them, no matter how different the two of you may seem at first. This \u2026 is what gives me hope.\u201d\u2014David Levithan,<\/span> \u201cWe\u201d<\/p>\n

Hope Nation: YA Authors Share Personal Moments of Inspiration<\/span> is a new collection of essays edited by Dr. Rose Brock,<\/span> a Texas librarian and educator, cofounder of the phenomenally successful North Texas Teen Book Festival and recipient of the Siddie Joe Johnson Award, bestowed by the Texas Library Association upon a librarian who \u201cdemonstrates outstanding library service to children.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brock chose tales of \u201cresilience, resistance, hardship, loss, love, tenacity, and acceptance\u201d from some of her favorite Young Adult authors because, as Mister Rogers famously advised, \u201cduring a crisis, it\u2019s vital to look for the helpers.\u201d Brock considers these authors and their stories to be helpers.\u00a0 >>READ MORE<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Texas ReadsGlenn Dromgoole >> archive New Jodi Thomas novel debuts this week Amarillo author Jodi Thomas\u2019s new standalone romance, Mornings on Main set in the fictional town of Laurel Springs, Texas, officially goes on sale Tuesday (HQN, $15.99 paperback). Jillian James is always on the move, searching for clues to her peripatetic past. She lands […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1280"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1280\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}