Joy & Matt will be proudly hosting authors Wes Blake and Michael Alessi, to discuss Blake’s novella, Pineville Trace.
Lee Martin, author of the Pulitzer Prize Finalist The Bright Forever, says, “A man escapes from prison only to find he can’t separate himself from his past. Pineville Trace is a story of a man on the run. Wes Blake renders the tale with great empathy and in language that’s so lyrical it practically lifts from the page. Blake is a writer to watch.”
Pineville Trace (available Sept. 3)
After being sentenced to a minimum-security prison in eastern Kentucky, former southern revival preacher and confidence man, Frank Russet, escapes. Taking only a cat named Buffalo and a desire to outrun his former life, he journeys to the fringes of society. As he struggles to survive, Frank confronts his past, seeking redemption amidst the wilderness. As Frank traverses the shadowy edges of society, he encounters remnants of his former self, forcing him to confront his deepest regrets and desires. Blake’s haunting prose captures the essence of a man on the brink of transformation, urging readers to ponder the thin line between redemption and damnation.
Wes Blake‘s fiction and essays have appeared in Louisiana Literature Journal, Blood & Bourbon, Book of Matches, Jelly Bucket, White Wall Review, and elsewhere. His novella, Pineville Trace, won the Etchings Press Book Prize at the University of Indianapolis. Lee Martin, author of the Pulitzer Prize Finalist, The Bright Forever, described him as “a writer to watch.” His novel, Antenna, was a semifinalist for the UNO Press Lab Prize. He holds an MFA from the Bluegrass Writers Studio. He lives in Kentucky.
“Blake’s prose glides along edges: balancing between simple diction and richly figurative imagery.”
—Julie Hensley, author of Landfall: A Ring of Stories
“Wes Blake’s Pineville Trace is a Pilgrim’s Progress through an America of our shared past; at times ardent or breathless, it is a dream book in the form of a road novel, a vision quest about finding a house in the trees… Blake’s novel shines into the spirit and reveals the struggle of our living in such worldly and spiritual conditions.”
—Matthew Haughton, author of Stand in the Stillness of Woods
Michael Alessi, a native of Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, is the author of the flash prose chapbooks The Horribles (Greying Ghost) and Call a Body Home (Mason Jar Press). His work has appeared in Mid-American Review, Passages North, The Pinch, The Cincinnati Review, and Ninth Letter, among other journals. He holds an MFA from Old Dominion University and is a doctoral candidate at the University of Cincinnati, where he serves as an assistant editor of Acre Books.
