{"id":47264,"date":"2015-02-18T17:00:54","date_gmt":"2015-02-18T23:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/?p=47264"},"modified":"2015-02-18T14:01:39","modified_gmt":"2015-02-18T20:01:39","slug":"sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel\/","title":{"rendered":"Sartoris Literary Group Announces Release of UM Professor’s Novel"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSON, Mississippi<\/strong> \u2013 Sartoris Literary Group announces the release of Casey’s Last Chance<\/em> by Joseph B. Atkins, available wherever fine books are sold. It will also be available in an eBook edition ($8.95).<\/p>\n

Written by University of Mississippi journalism professor Joseph B. Atkins, Casey’s Last Chance <\/em>has garnered high praise, including:<\/p>\n

“Move over Greg Iles and make room for another novelist who traffics in treachery, wild rides, unreconstructed Nazis and rogue agents. In Casey\u2019s Last Chance<\/em>, Joseph B. Atkins establishes for himself a place in the top ranks of Southern gothic storytellers, with a cast of evil characters and a few good men and women to fight them.”\u2014Curtis Wilkie<\/strong>, author of The Fall of the House of Zeus<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Joe Atkins\u2019s\u00a0Casey\u2019s Last Chance<\/em>\u00a0is such pitch-perfect vintage noir, you can almost smell the cigarette burning in the ashtray, a woman\u2019s perfume drifting past. With a twisty plot, vibrant characters, and hardboiled grit to burn, it\u2019s everything you want in a crime novel.”\u2014Megan Abbott, Edgar-award-winning author of Dare Me<\/em> and The Fever<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

“Joe Atkins has crafted an original, provocative take on the 1960s South. This story has it all \u2014 mobsters, assassinations, romance, gothic landscapes, and a cast of characters you\u2019ll remember long after you\u2019ve read the final sentence.”\u2014Neil <\/strong>White, author of In the Sanctuary of Outcasts<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

“The sense of place in Casey’s Last Chance<\/em> is palpable. The author knows the long dark stretches of blacktop between dim lights on Mississippi secondary roads, the dangerous sections abruptly encountered in our few cities, the little towns with photographs in filling station windows of mere boys and handwritten signs that say STOP THE KILLING.\u00a0You can follow Casey’s route with this novel as a richly annotated road map.\u00a0 But take my advice.\u00a0 Drive a clean reliable car in daylight under the speed limit, but not too much.\u00a0 Speak politely if stopped. At night, I wouldn’t drive Casey’s route except with puncture proof tires, a bright flashlight, and a .38 caliber detective special in my glove box.”\u2014Jere Hoar, author of\u00a0Body Parts<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0The Hit<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Written in a hardboiled, noir style, Casey’s Last Chance<\/em> takes you back to the days of Raymond Chandler, when characters knew only one direction\u2014straight ahead, their fedoras tilted into the wind. Author Atkins writes fiction the way Jimi Hendrix played guitar, with delicate fingering that explodes into soaring, lyrical riffs when least expected.<\/p>\n

Casey Eubanks, is a small-time North Carolina hustler on the run after angrily firing a shot over the head of his girlfriend Orella during an argument and accidentally killing his cousin. He seeks refuge with a crony, Clyde Point, who steers him to a big operator in Memphis, Max Duren, a shadowy former Nazi with a wide financial network across the South. The story takes place in the U.S. South in July 1960 and is reflective of underworld opposition to organized labor.<\/p>\n

Duren hires Casey to kill Ala Gadomska, a labor organizer who is stirring up trouble at one of Duren\u2019s mills in northern Mississippi. Casey sets up for a sniper shot during a rally, but can\u2019t go through with it. She\u2019s beautiful, makes sense, and maybe he\u2019s developing a conscience.<\/p>\n

Now he\u2019s on the run again, this time from Duren\u2019s goons as well as the cops. Enter Martin Wolfe, a freelance reporter investigating Duren\u2019s operation. He tries to talk Casey into joining forces with him and FBI agent Hardy Beecher to bring Duren down.<\/p>\n

Casey dumps Wolfe, steals his car, and returns home to Orella. A Duren goon awaits him there, however. A bloody shootout leaves Orella dead and convinces Casey to partner with Wolfe and Beecher.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s Casey\u2019s last chance. The three take off across the South to execute a plan\u2014with the help of Ala Gadomska\u2014to destroy Duren. Everything works according to plan until the explosive end, at which point no one is able to escape unscathed.<\/p>\n

ABOUT THE AUTHOR<\/strong><\/p>\n

Joseph B. Atkins is a veteran journalist and writer who teaches journalism at the University of Mississippi. A North Carolina native and former congressional correspondent, Atkins is author of Covering for the Bosses: Labor and the Southern Press<\/em> (University Press of Mississippi). His fiction has appeared in Hardboiled<\/em> and Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine<\/em>, and his novella Crossed Roads<\/em> was a finalist in the Pirate\u2019s Alley Faulkner Awards in New Orleans. He has homes in Oxford and Memphis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

JACKSON, Mississippi \u2013 Sartoris Literary Group announces the release of Casey’s Last Chance by Joseph B. Atkins, available wherever fine books are sold. It will also be available in an eBook edition ($8.95). Written by University of Mississippi journalism professor Joseph B. Atkins, Casey’s Last Chance has garnered high praise, including: “Move over Greg IlesRead the story …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[524],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nSartoris Literary Group Announces Release of UM Professor's Novel - Ole Miss News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sartoris Literary Group Announces Release of UM Professor's Novel - Ole Miss News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"JACKSON, Mississippi \u2013 Sartoris Literary Group announces the release of Casey’s Last Chance by Joseph B. Atkins, available wherever fine books are sold. It will also be available in an eBook edition ($8.95). Written by University of Mississippi journalism professor Joseph B. Atkins, Casey’s Last Chance has garnered high praise, including: “Move over Greg IlesRead the story …\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Ole Miss News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-02-18T23:00:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-02-18T20:01:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@OleMissRebels\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@OleMissRebels\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/\",\"name\":\"Ole Miss News\",\"description\":\"The official source for University of Mississippi news\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel\/\",\"name\":\"Sartoris Literary Group Announces Release of UM Professor's Novel - Ole Miss News\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2015-02-18T23:00:54+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-02-18T20:01:39+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#\/schema\/person\/c2ecbc81751a637a438366fac729509f\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/sartoris-literary-group-announces-release-um-professors-novel\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#\/schema\/person\/c2ecbc81751a637a438366fac729509f\",\"name\":\"rwhittington\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#personlogo\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/2.gravatar.com\/avatar\/bc6ee1e81fe690560a917b5c994b20ff?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"rwhittington\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47264"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47264"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47264\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47265,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47264\/revisions\/47265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}