Author Appearance with Thomas Mullen
Presenter: Thomas Mullen, author of Darktown, Lightning Men, The Last Town on Earth
Thank you, Mr. Mullen, for your book discussion today at the Reed House.
Award-winning author and Decatur resident Thomas Mullen discussed his novel Darktown and the real-life history that inspired it. Set in 1948, when the city of Atlanta hired its first eight African-American police officers, Darktown paints a portrait of a city on the cusp of great change. Following the stories of two black and two white officers, the book explores resonant issues of race, police, and the criminal justice system while showing how the coming Civil Rights Movement would impact life in Atlanta, the South, and the United States--in ways we're still experiencing today.
Thomas Mullen’s newest novel, Lightning Men, was named one of the Top Ten Crime Novels of 2017 by The New York Times. He’s the author of four other novels, including Darktown, an NPR Best Book of 2016, which was shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the Southern Book Prize, the Indies Choice Book Award, and was nominated for two Crime Writers Association Dagger Awards; The Last Town on Earth, which was named Best Debut Novel of 2006 by USA Today and was awarded the James Fenimore Cooper Prize for excellence in historical fiction; and The Many Deaths of the Firefly Brothers, which was awarded the Townsend Prize for best novel by a Georgia author. Two of his books have been named Books All Georgians Should Read, and the "Darktown" series is being developed for television by Amazon Studios, Sony Pictures, and executive producer Jamie Foxx. He lives with his family in Decatur.
Attendees also enjoyed refreshments and a booksigning after the presentation.
Smyrna Reads is sponsored by The Friends of Smyrna Library.
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