Praise for Graceland, At Last "Margaret Renkl''s weekly essays for the New York Times offer a model for how to move through our world with insight and sensitivity. Graceland, At Last takes in the full scope of her surroundings, and the reader walks away wanting to see as she sees, hear what she hears, smell what she smells. It''s a stellar collection that spans nature writing and cultural criticism, the present and the past, full of explorations of religion, belief, and Southern politics that flex a cordial, probing curiosity. She picks good heroes--John Lewis, John Prine, ''the lowly Tennessee coneflower''--and she makes sharp judgments without sounding judgmental. At a moment of extreme division, Renkl writes with a generosity of spirit, as a neighbor rather than ideologue." --PEN America Judges'' Citation, Winner of the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay "[ Graceland, At Last ] is Renkl at her most tender and most fierce. Renkl''s gift, just as it was in her first book Late Migrations , is to make fascinating for others what is closest to her heart. What rises in me after reading her essays is [John] Lewis'' famous urging to get in good trouble to make the world fairer and better.
Many people in the South are doing just that--and through her beautiful writing, Renkl is among them."-- NPR "In this luminous collection, Renkl delivers smart, beautifully crafted personal and political observations. I keep this book nearby to revisit the humanity and hope in its pages."-- Minneapolis Star Tribune "Renkl''s perspective feels like a guiding light. No matter where you''re from, column after column, Margaret Renkl will make you feel right at home."-- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette "Amazing and inspiring. [ Graceland, At Last ] will help you figure out concrete things you can do to save the planet." --Ann Patchett, author of The Dutch House " Graceland, At Last gathers a selection of Renkl''s columns from the past four years, inviting loyal readers and newcomers alike to take in Renkl''s perspective on the world.
Whether extolling the wonders of a rattlesnake or lamenting Southern Christians'' support of oppressive policies, Renkl engages with her home region''s beauty and complexity." -- BookPage "Everyone should have a friend like Margaret Renkl: thoughtful, engaged, compassionate and, above all, acutely observant. Since that''s not always possible, the next best thing is to share her company in the diverse and consistently stimulating essay collection Graceland, At Last. Renkl is both unfailingly honest and deeply empathetic in creating the vivid portrait of her home region that emerges organically from these intensely personal and well-informed essays."-- Shelf Awareness "Reading the short essays in this book has strengthened my understanding and love for the South, its people, its land, and its complexities. I especially have enjoyed reading Renkl''s thoughtful reflections on flora and fauna, and I find myself looking to my changing backyard this fall with a new appreciation."-- Garden & Gun , "New Reads for Fall 2021" "[Renkl] doesn''t shy from hard topics but explores them with the careful hand of someone whose heart yearns for healing, growth, and understanding for the region she loves. A must read for those who live and love the South!"-- Country Living , "Best Books of Fall 2021" "As the essays collected in Graceland, At Last prove, she''s challenged her readers to rise and confront many of the complex issues facing our Southern communities.
Renkl, an Alabama native and lifelong Southerner living in Nashville, does so with such deep respect and understanding, and such powerful, insightful, Southern-accented prose, that even her polemics come off as love letters. We catch glimpses of ourselves in her wise and poignant reflections, and I for one am grateful and grinning."-- Charleston Post and Courier "In her newest book, Graceland, At Last , Renkl invites readers--southerners and non-southerners alike--into her homeland, her city, her yard. What we discover along the way is a place that is both ''damaged and damaging,'' but also full of people who inspire and landscapes too beautiful for words. Through these warm and heartfelt essays, Renkl shows us how to keep on loving this complicated place, how to look right at its ''appalling truths'' and gesture, still , toward hope."-- Southern Humanities Review "While [ Graceland, At Last ] is not a how-to, we come away with how to better ''belong to one another'' in a time when we desperately need to."-- Arkansas International "From her home in Nashville--''a blue dot in the red sea of Tennessee''--[Renkl] writes perceptively of the region where she was born and raised (in Alabama), educated (in South Carolina), and settled. Renkl vividly evokes the lush natural beauty of the rivers, old-growth forests, ''red-dirt pineywoods,'' marshes, and coastal plains that she deeply loves.
A wide-ranging look at the realities of the South."-- Kirkus Reviews "If you''ve happened upon the poignant and off-road opinion pieces Renkl writes as a contributor to The New York Times, you already know that the natural world is something she closely observes and uses as a springboard to contemplate other, less tangible subjects. Her life story and her life''s passion intertwine, like a fence post and a trumpet vine." --Maureen Corrigan, NPR''s Fresh Air " Graceland, At Last takes us to Renkl''s homeland and shines a light on life in the South, its complexities and its hopes. In these pages, you will find Black Lives Matter organizers, churches sheltering the homeless, and even helpful sheep. Reading Margaret Renkl is like seeing the world in color for the first time."-- Literary Hub , "Most Anticipated Books of 2021" " New York Times columnist Renkl effectively lifts the lid on Southern culture and challenges its stereotypes in this versatile compendium. Renkl''s essays cover the natural world, local politics, Southern-fried art and culture, and social justice issues from a Nashvillian perspective.
Her nature writing shows an impressive predilection for botany and ornithology. [ Graceland, At Last ] serves as a well-written collection for anyone interested in everyday life below the Mason-Dixon Line."-- Publishers Weekly "Like nothing else in the newspaper, [Renkl''s columns] burst with awareness of the things of nature, awareness that our lives are led in that midst, permeated with and part of the natural world. All is written with an open, joyful, yet steady voice of wonder." -- Philadelphia Inquirer "In 1956, author E.B. White suggested that newspapers cover nature as eagerly as commerce, having columns devoted not only to the flow of business but also the arrival of birds. Renkl .
seems like a belated answer to White . [crafting] graceful sentences that White would surely have enjoyed. A collection of her Times columns would be a welcome thing." -- Wall Street Journal "Renkl is a master prose stylist, her generation''s E.B. White. Whatever she writes about comes alive through carefully crafted sentences in which sound and sense harmonize at the highest levels."-- California Review of Books "Renkl is so likable, as a writer and an individual, with her rich family traditions, her concern for justice, and her observant and unsentimental love of nature, that every paragraph feels like a conversation with a friend.
" -- Brevity "It''s heartening to see a columnist for a major American newspaper writing regularly about nature with a passion the media''s chattering classes typically reserve only for politics and entertainment. Renkl''s columns deserve to be read again, and for years to come."-- Christian Science Monitor "Renkl''s essays alternate between balm for the soul and outrage at the world with all of its injustices. She makes me think and see things in a different light and for that I''m eternally grateful."-- Indie Next List (September 2021), selected by Jayne Gowsam, Mystery to Me "Readers can easily home in on one of the book''s wide-ranging six sections, sample an essay or two from each, or barrel through from start to finish, as whim dictates. Renkl''s voice is calm, steady, and sometimes surprising. She celebrates a host of new voices in southern writing and sees in their work the light of justice and hope for the South." -- Booklist "Renkl is one of my absolute favorite writers working today.
Like Late Migrations before it, Graceland, At Last is a gift--full of sorrow, joy, grief, and yes--hope. I implore you to read her work."-- Alex Brubaker, Midtown Scholar Bookstore "Renkl is my favorite essayist. Every week I look for her column in the opinion pages of the New York Times . In a time when the country has such deep divisions, I can rely on her writing to be all heart, no sna.