Mark Your Calendar

Literary Twofers: Inprint brings a double dose of fictive fun with Emma Donoghue& Hari Kunzru

Emma Donoghue's Astray
Author Emma Donoghue

Photo by © Nina Subin
Author Hari Kunzru

Photo by Michael Lionstar
Hari Kunzru's Gods Without Men

Editor's Note: As part of CultureMap's State of the Arts series, we are highlighting upcoming fall arts events you won't want to miss.

The fall arts season is set to harvest a bumper crop of new books and visiting writers reading from them. The Houston bookstores’ calendars are filling up with author appearances and Inprint has an intriguing lineup scheduled for its Margarett Root Brown Reading Series with big names like Junot Diaz, T. C. Boyle, and Zadie Smith on its 2012-2013 roster for solo reads.

But the literary events we’re most looking forward to are the duet reads, like the double dose of new fiction from Emma Donoghue and Hari Kunzru on Nov. 12.

Readings with two or three novelist or poets tend to be nights of artistic discovery. On a kind of literary double date, we might find our eyes wandering over to this new guy sitting to our old love.

Yes, one of the best things about author readings is that one-on-one audience time we have together to listen to a work in an author’s own voice and then ask our questions. Yet, sometimes it’s double the fun when there are two writers sharing the podium for the price of one, be that price zero (students and senior citizens, if the Inprint event is not sold out) or five dollars (general admission tickets).

Readings with two or three novelist or poets tend to be nights of artistic discovery. We might be a fan of one writer but have little knowledge of the other. On a kind of literary double date, we might find our eyes wandering over to this new guy sitting next to our old love. Beguiled by the new imagined world he temps us to traverse, we decide to take him home with us too (in book form, of course).

There’s also always the possibility for a little discrete, always polite, onstage drama. During Inprint’s two-author events, they seem to enjoy sharing the spotlight most of the time, but there have been nights when the duet turned into a subtle duel because of a literary rivalry or a bad review one had written about the other. Nothing was said onstage, but the body language could have written a novel onto itself.

And sometime it's the other way around. During one Inprint event several seasons ago, two authors seemed rather taken with each other, so much so that they disappeared after the reading and even their agents didn’t know where they had absconded to a day later.

The first of four double author events during Inprint’s 2012-2013 season, the Donoghue and Kunzru read will probably not be so dramatic, but will certainly have some cool accents.

Donoghue is a Dublin born writer who now calls Canada her home. Her previous bestselling novel, Room, won the Orange Prize and was a finalist for the Booker Prize. Her new book Astray will have only been out for 10 days before her Houston appearance.

Novelist, journalist, and essayist Hari Kunzru was born in London, of English and Kashmiri parents, and now lives in New York. Named one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists, his latest novel Gods Without Men has been compared to David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas. Gods Without Men tells multiple stories spanning from the eighteenth century to present day that are all in someway connected to the Pinnacle Rocks in the Mojave Desert.

If you enjoy finding those amazing two-for-one specials, mark your calendars for the those literary duets and trios coming this fall.

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Music feature

Texas country star Cody Johnson's new album goes to 'Banks of Trinity'

Photo by Cameron Powell

Cody Johnson.

There's a moment at every Cody Johnson show where the Texas-born-and-bred country star asks the crowd, “How many of you tonight are watching me and this band live for the very first time?” he told The Associated Press. “And every night, I would say at least 80% of the crowd raises their hands.”

It's not the kind of reaction most veteran artists receive. “And I’m thinking, you know, 20 years is a long time to work for something. But when you see that … What’s the next 20 years look like?” he asks.

The rancher, rodeo competitor, and onetime prison guard started his two-decade career playing honky tonks and dive bars. That led to slow and steady growth for the country traditionalist, but in the last few years, something has shifted. He landed his fifth career No. 1 song with “The Fall.” He was named Entertainer of the Year at the 2026 Academy of Country Music Awards, the show's highest honor. That was a month after he headlined Stagecoach Music Festival. For an artist with legions of fans, it looked like he was accessing new heights.

“I feel like I’m closing a book and I’m opening another one and it’s all blank pages,” he says of this period. “Let's get to the next chapter." On June 26, that new era began with the release of his latest album, Banks of the Trinity.

Traveling to the Banks of the Trinity
It hasn't been an easy road. Last fall, Johnson had to cancel a bunch of tour dates after upper respiratory and sinus infections caused a burst eardrum that required surgery — an intimidating medical procedure for anyone, but especially nerve-wracking for a musician. “I was scared,” he said simply. But “in a roundabout way, it’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to me.”

It forced him to take three months off, which allowed him to be home during the birth of his son. It also rejuvenated his approach in the studio. Before the incident, he thought the album was complete. It was not. The additional time resulted in the inclusion of a few songs that now feel inextricable from the record: “Thank Somebody Country,” “Take Me Back (Leave Me There),” “Cricket on a Hook,” and the resilient “I Have” among them.

“What a blessing to have that kind of song fall in your lap when you’re kind of up against the ropes,” he says of the latter. “I mean, we thought we had the record done. It wasn’t done.”

A title track with real resonance
At the heart of Banks of the Trinity is its title track, which recalls Eagles' cover of “Seven Bridges Road” meets bluegrass and Southern gospel.

Lyrically, it's an ode to Johnson's childhood. “I grew up on the banks of the Trinity [River.] Fishing for catfish, not so much out of pleasure or sport but for necessity to put food in the freezer. Deer season for me was not a trophy thing,” he said.

And while that track inspires a feeling of nostalgia within the listener, he doesn't consider this album a throwback collection. He says it's about showcasing his evolving sonic diversity.

"The rest of the album for me is a musical journey from track one to track 16,” he said. “There’s a little bit of a flavor for everybody. It does kind of hit Motown. It does kind of hit bluegrass. It does hit progressive country. It does it old country. It does a little rock here and there.”

It's the result of a new kind of freedom, one that is at least partially due to his recent accomplishments, including taking home the top prize at the ACM Awards.

“I just did the thing that I’ve aspired to do in my career my entire life,” he says. “A really good place is a really good way to describe where I am.”

And now that the album is out, he's ready to take a breather.

“I will be shirtless with no shoes on a beach at an undisclosed location,” he jokes about the days after record release. “'Cause I have already done all the prep work. I've been working on this album for two years. I’ve done all of the interviews. I’ve shook all the hands. Me and my wife and kids are gonna disappear for 10 days and I’m gonna become, I guess, every Kenny Chesney song ever.”

texas country artist cody johnson interview music