Sutherland Springs was the last place anyone would have expected to be victimized by our modern-day scourge of mass shootings. Founded in the 1850s along historic Cibolo Creek, the tiny community, named for the designated physician during the siege of the Alamo, was once a vibrant destination for wealthy tourists looking to soak up the "cures" of its namesake mineral springs. By November 5, 2017, however, the day a former Air Force enlistee opened fire in the town's First Baptist Church, killing twenty-six people, Sutherland Springs was a shadow of its former self. Twenty-six people died that Sunday morning, in the worst mass shooting in a place of worship in American history. Holley, who roams the Lone Star State as the "Native Texan" columnist for the Houston Chronicle and earned a Pulitzer- Prize nomination for his editorials about guns, spent more than a year embedded in the community. Long after most journalists had left, he stayed with his fellow Texans, getting to know a close-knit group of people - victims, heroes, and survivors. Marked by both a deep faith in God and in guns, Holley shows how they work to come to terms with their loss and to rebuild shattered lives. He also uses the Sutherland Springs' unique history and its decades-long decline as a prism for understanding how an act of unspeakable violence reflects the complicated realities of Texas and America in the twenty-first century.

Larry McMurtry declares, "Texas itself doesn't have anything to do with why I write. It never did." Horton Foote, on the other hand, says, "I've just never had a desire to write about any place else." In between those figurative bookends are hundreds of other writers-- some internationally recognized, others just becoming known-- who draw inspiration and often subject matter from the unique places and people that are Texas. To give everyone who is interested in Texas writing a representative sampling of the breadth and vitality of the state's current literary production, this volume features conversations with fifty of Texas's most notable established writers and emerging talents.

The writers included here work in a wide variety of genres-- novels, short stories, poetry, plays, screenplays, essays, nonfiction, and magazine journalism. In their conversations with interviewers from the Writers' League of Texas and other authors' organizations, the writers speak of their apprenticeships, literary influences, working habits, connections with their readers, and the domestic and public events that have shaped their writing. Accompanying the interviews are excerpts from the writers' work, as well as their photographs, biographies, and bibliographies. Joe Holley's introductory essay-- an overview of Texas writing from Cabeza de Vaca's 1542 Relacio n to the work of today's generation of writers, who are equally at home in Hollywood as in Texas-- provides the necessary context to appreciate such a diverse collection of literary voices.

A sampling from the book: "This land has been my subject matter. One thing that distinguishes me from the true naturalist isthat I've never been able to look at land without thinking of the people who've been on it. It's fundamental to me." -- John Graves "Writing is a way to keep ourselves more in touch with everything we experience. It seems the best gifts and thoughts are given to us when we pause, take a deep breath, look around, see what's there, and return to where we were, revived." -- Naomi Shihab Nye "I've said this many times in print: the novel is the middle-age genre. Very few people have written really good novels when they are young, and few people have written really good novels when they are old. You just tail off, and lose a certain level of concentration. Your imaginative energy begins to lag. I feel like I'm repeating myself, and most writers do repeat themselves." -- Larry McMurtry "I was a pretty poor cowhand. I grew up on the Macaraw Ranch, east of Crane, Texas. My father tried very hard to make a cowboy out of me, but in my case it never seemed to work too well. I had more of a literary bent. I loved to read, and very early on I began to write small stories, short stories, out of the things I liked to read." -- Elmer Kelton

Native Texan: Deep in the Heart of the Lone Star State is a lively and personal tour of small town and big city Texas in search of what makes the state unique. Nationally acclaimed columnist Joe Holley is widely loved for his popular “Native Texan” column, which appears in the Houston Chronicle. In thirty-five stories curated from column archives, Holley introduces readers to his favorite people and places across the state. From interviews on the “weird” streets of Austin and his search for ghosts in Bigfoot to a decades-long love affair with everything about Marathon and hikes on the back trails of the Big Bend, Holley is a masterful storyteller. His instincts are backed by a seasoned journalist’s passion to measure legends and tall tales against investigations into what really happened. He reveals small-town Texas, and some small towns within the largest cities, with a style that has proven popular with readers and a keen eye for a unique spin on an old story. The result is an entertaining and certainly surprising view of the Lone Star state.

Like many Texans, Michael H. Marvins has been making regular pilgrimages to the Hill Country for much of his life. Traveling the back roads of the Texas Hill Country, cameras always poised for action, Marvins has captured the excitement of small-town rodeos, savored the mesquite-smoked atmosphere of local eateries, observed the daily lives of people on the land, and admired the scenic beauty of the landscape and its natural denizens. Most important, he has captured his impressions with the skilled eye of a master photographer. Popular Houston Chronicle columnist Joe Holley opens The Texas Hill Country by highlighting the many qualities that draw Marvins-and so many of the rest of us-to the Hill Country. Next, Roy Flukinger, senior curator of photography at the University of Texas' Harry Ransom Center, discusses Marvins's unique photographic vision and the fresh ways in which he helps us see this popular region. But the principal focus in The Texas Hill Country: A Photographic Adventure centers on Marvins's artful images, inviting readers to share his unique perspectives on this enchanting and popular region. He takes us with him on leisurely backcountry drives and into the laughter and swirl of dance halls. His lens embraces the people, the land, and the culture that keep so many Texans-and would-be Texans-coming back to the Hill Country again and again.

Cary Clack has captured the hearts and minds of Texans since the mid-1990s, gaining a national reputation as an incisive and sensitive journalist and developing a significant following as a columnist. Originally from San Antonio, he worked with the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta (writing CNN commentaries for Coretta Scott King) to hone his communication skills and broaden his social sensibilities. Returning to his hometown, he quickly became known as a writer who profiled everyday heroes and captured stories unique to the Texas experience, adding a critical local perspective to national news. His columns are infused with a sense of humility and a keen examination of the humanness in others. Following sixteen years as a journalist, Clack pursued interests in politics, social policy, and service, including work with the mayor of San Antonio, U.S. congressman Joaquin Castro, and others. More Finish Lines to Cross is a collection of Clack’s best short- and long-form columns since his return to the San Antonio Express-News in 2014. It includes more than eighty pieces about the issues of the day, from Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and the war in Ukraine to the impact of COVID, the death of George Floyd, and the mass shooting of schoolchildren in Uvalde, Texas. Along the way we meet the people who influenced Clack, which in turn reminds us to reflect on how we become the people we are and what inspires us to be better members of our communities.