dimestore
July 25, 2016 In Memphis magazine By Richard J. Alley

Dimestore

My wife Kristy and I celebrated our 22nd wedding anniversary last month. I fell for her in high school, in part, because she was a reader. She was a reader long before I was, and for years she told me, “You have to read Fair and Tender Ladies.” Lee Smith’s story of Ivy Rowe, a girl who grows into womanhood and finds her strength in the Appalachian Mountains, is Kristy’s favorite novel of Smith’s. And for years I shrugged the suggestion off even as I delved into Hemingway and Cheever and Barry Hannah and Toni Morrison. READ MORE

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cityonfire
May 13, 2016 In Book review By Richard J. Alley

City on Fire: a long, slow burn

This review originally appeared in The Memphis Flyer.

“Are you trying to set a record for the longest time to read a book?” My wife asked me this question one night recently as I turned to page 745.

I began reading City on Fire (Knopf) by Garth Risk Hallberg when it first came out. That was back in October of last year, and I’ve only just finished. I’m a notoriously slow reader, and this tome is 944 pages. Still, I should have finished it earlier. Why didn’t I? Things got in the way: Work. Kids. I clicked around on Facebook, made a tweet or two. I binge-watched House of Cards andDaredevil. We started and finished every season of Black Sails in the time it’s taken me to read this book.READ MORE

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book_frannyandzooey-mag
December 22, 2015 In Book review, Memphis Flyer By Richard J. Alley

Remembering Franny and Zooey and Jim

Wrapping paper. Sugar-sweet carols. Televised cartoon specials. Noise-making toys. Tinsel everywhere. I have four children, so this is how my Christmases have looked and sounded for the past 17 years. And that’s great. This is just how it should be — loud and colorful and joyful.

But I need my alone time, so every year I’ve managed to carve out a little space just for myself during these end-of-year celebrations. While the kids are watching those television specials or playing with their toys or baking cookies, I’ve made it a point to take a book off the shelf, sit, and read. And for many years — more than I can remember, really — that book has been Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger.READ MORE

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book_unfaithfulmusic
December 10, 2015 In Book review By Richard J. Alley

Book review: Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink

by Elvis Costello (Blue Rider Press)

Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink by Elvis Costello is a book about show business. It can be said that Costello’s career didn’t begin with the release of 1977’s My Aim Is True, but when Costello, as a young boy, accompanied his father to the Hammersmith Palais in London where he worked as a crooner with the Joe Loss Orchestra. Show business is the MacManus (Costello’s given name is Declan MacManus) family business. It was in the darkened ballrooms of his youth that Costello first learned not only how to hold a note but how to hold an audience. More than merely getting up on stage to belt out a tune, he learned about persona and character, conveying a story or emotion, and engaging a crowd. Such a life is Costello’s birthright.READ MORE

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g5
May 11, 2015 In "Because I Said So" By Richard J. Alley

Children keep this newly published author grounded

My mother used to walk my sisters and me up to the main library at Peabody and McLean when we were kids. That’s where it all started, this love of books. That, and seeing her reading for pleasure. Then there were the friends — the girl I met in high school who would become my wife and, later, a librarian — who helped to guide and goad my reading. It was the best form of peer pressure. Even more than school, I’d say, it was these friends and family who shaped me as a reader and, eventually, a writer.

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