{"id":59588,"date":"2019-01-02T16:14:32","date_gmt":"2019-01-02T22:14:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=59588"},"modified":"2019-01-02T16:14:39","modified_gmt":"2019-01-02T22:14:39","slug":"north-mississippi-native-doctor-and-award-winning-writer-pens-unforgettable-debut-novel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/north-mississippi-native-doctor-and-award-winning-writer-pens-unforgettable-debut-novel\/","title":{"rendered":"North Mississippi Native, Doctor and Award-Winning Writer Pens Unforgettable Debut Novel"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>by Mississippi native and Ole Miss Alum Dwaine Rieves Slated for January 2019 Release<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Published by Leapfolio, a division of Tupelo Press,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>will be available on January 8, 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Award-winning writer, Ole Miss<\/strong> Alum and Mississippi native Dwaine Rieves<\/strong> will celebrate the release of his debut novel,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free<\/strong>,\u00a0<\/em>on January 8, 2019. Published by Tupelo Press<\/strong> joint venture partner Leapfolio<\/strong>,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>will be available where fine books are sold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rieves, a physician and winner of the River Styx International Poetry Prize<\/strong> and the Tupelo Press Prize for Poetry<\/strong>, delivers a captivating, confident, and assured debut novel in\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Set against the backdrop of a wildly polarizing election,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>is the story of souls\u2014and the bodies that won\u2019t let them go.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

About\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free:\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Doctor Jane Beekman has seen her dying mother\u2019s soul, a vision above the bed\u2014a soul struggling with a decision, some undone task, something in this world too noble to leave. The sight, however brief, was surely a lesson.\u00a0 The question that lingers\u2014why?<\/em>\u2014prompts a shift in the doctor\u2019s priorities.\u00a0 In this election year, Jane must do what her mother, an aspiring social activist, would have done. Soon, Jane is embroiled in the world of Georgia politics, working to make sure her dynamic younger brother-in-law Jackson Beekman is selected as the next governor, regardless of what the soul of the candidate\u2019s dead father or that of his living brother\u2014Jane\u2019s husband\u2014might want done.\u00a0 Indeed, it is a mother\u2019s persistence and a father\u2019s legacy that will ultimately turn one Beekman brother against the other, launching a struggle with moral consequences that may extend far beyond Georgia. Set amidst 2004\u2019s polarizing election fears\u2014immigrants and job take-overs, terrorists in waiting, homosexuals, and outsider agendas\u2014Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>makes vivid the human soul\u2019s struggle in a world bedeviled by desire and the fears that leave us all asking\u2014Why?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Engaging, beautifully written and resplendent with realism,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>is a standout debut destined to stay with readers long after the final page is turned. Thoughtful and thought-provoking, poignant, poetic, and populated with unforgettable characters,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>explores the impact of a parent\u2019s death and legacy on the lives of surviving sons and daughters. A meticulously crafted tale that showcases an outstanding new voice in Southern fiction,\u00a0Shirtless Men Drink Free\u00a0<\/em>has garnered high advance praise:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDwaine Rieves writes fiction with such authority that it\u2019s hard to believe Shirtless Men Drink Free<\/em> is a first novel and not a tenth. This is brilliant and rare work, as attentive to an absorbing plot as it is to a poetic, chiseled cadence.”\u2014Paul Lisicky<\/strong>, award-winning author of The Narrow Door: A Memoir of Friendship<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese\u00a0characters are all too real. Rieves, as Faulkner, McMurtry, and Larry Brown, writes people and story that will worm, burrow into you.\u00a0 Change you even.\u201d\u2014<\/em>Adam Van Winkle,<\/strong>\u00a0Founder and Editor,\u00a0Cowboy Jamboree<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA powerfully immersive and moving novel with richly developed characters whose voices range from edgy to elegiac.  Vividly sensuous, this novel is full of textures, sounds and smells.  Rieves tells a terrific story with the sensitivity of a poet.  This is as haunting and wise a novel as any you will read this year.\u201d \u2014Margaret Meyers<\/strong>, author of Swimming in the Congo<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dwaine Rieves was born and raised in Monroe County<\/strong>, Mississippi. Follow\u00ading a career as a research pharmaceutical scientist and critical care physician, Rieves completed an MA in writing from Johns Hopkins University<\/strong>. His poetry has won the Tupelo Press Prize for Poetry and the River Styx International Poetry Prize. His writing has appeared in\u00a0The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Georgia Review<\/strong>\u00a0<\/em>and other publications. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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