Jamie Quatro’s collection of short stories, “I Want to Show You More,” was released recently to glowing reviews from The New Yorker, The New York Times and The New York Times Book Review.IF YOU GOWhat: Celebration of Southern Literature.When: 9 a.m.-7 p.m. Thursday, 9 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Friday, 9 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Saturday.Where: The Tivoli Theatre, 709 Broad St.Admission: $30-$100, registration is required and one-day tickets are available.Phone: 267-1218.Note: Each day consists of a variety of events, including book signings, readings and panel discussions. Visit southernlitalliance.org for the full schedule.
Jamie Quatro’s online biography includes a story of a seemingly “magical” turn of events and chance meetings leading up to her signing with Grove Press, publishers of her first book, “I Want to Show You More,” a collection of short stories.
Whether it’s magic or talent or a combination of both, Quatro, who lives on Lookout Mountain with her husband and children, continues to lead a seemingly charmed life for a new writer. In recent weeks, The New Yorker, The New York Times and The New York Times Book Review have all run glowing reviews of the book.
“Jamie Quatro’s ‘I Want to Show You More’ is an obsessive first collection that feels like a fifth or sixth,” J. Robert Lennon wrote in the Times Book Review. “It is a dogged, brutally thoughtful piece of work, and gives us a writer of great originality and apparent artistic maturity who seems to have come out of nowhere.
“Though Quatro is gifted at conventional psychological realism, she is strongest here when she ventures into the fantastic. Her flights of fancy are never ostentatious or arbitrary; instead they grow naturally out of the emotional and psychological states of her characters.”