Archived Event
Please join the East Tennessee Historical Society and Friends of the Knox County Public Library for an evening with award-winning Southern author Sharyn McCrumb on Wednesday, May 25, at 7 p.m. at the East Tennessee History Center. The event is free and open to the public.
A light reception will precede the event at 6:30 p.m., and books will be available for purchase and signing.
McCrumb will discuss her new Ballad novel, Prayers the Devil Answers. The novel tells the story of Ellie Robbins, who is appointed to serve out the term of her late husband as sheriff of their rural Tennessee mountain town. The year is 1936, and her role is largely symbolic, except for the one task that only a sheriff can do: execute a convicted prisoner.
The Ballad series includes the New York Times bestsellers The Ballad of Tom Dooley, She Walks These Hills, and The Rosewood Casket.
McCrumb, whose books celebrate the history and folklore of Appalachia, was educated at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Virginia Tech. She lives and writes in Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains, fewer than 100 miles from where her family settled in 1790.
Local and Regional Media Coverage of Sharyn McCrumb
- Chapter 16
- Knoxville News Sentinel (article)
- Knoxville News Sentinel (book review)
Photo Gallery
- Author Sharyn McCrumb speaking at the East Tennessee History Center, May 25, 2016
- Sharyn McCrumb speaking about her latest book, Prayers the Devil Answers
- Audience members wait in line at book signing after Sharyn McCrumb’s talk, May 25, 2016
- Sharyn McCrumb signing books after her talk, May 25, 2016
- Sharyn McCrumb signs book as Friends board member Rusha Sams watches
- Sharyn McCrumb’s book signing, May 25, 2016
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Photo: Sharyn McCrumb at the Zeblon Homeplace.