Join us for an exciting evening with Xan Brooks, Guardian film critic and acclaimed author, for the release of his second novel The Catchers. Exploring the commercial origins of early popular music that were likely built upon exploitation, the legacy of the blues of the Mississippi Delta, and the saviours and devils of the early recording industry, The Catchers is beautifully written, wildly unexpected, superbly characterised novel.

Date:
Thursday 14th of November

Venue:
Max Minerva's, 47 Henleaze Road, BS9 4JU

Time:
Doors at 18:30. Discussion at 19:00. Finish at 20:00.

Tickets:
£5.50 ticket only
£10.99 ticket with The Catchers
£1 Pay What You Can
(Please only choose the PWYC tickets if you need to, they are limited and intended for those who really need them.)

50p from each ticket goes to Caring In Bristol

You don't need to bring your ticket with you, we will have a list of names on the door. Books will be available to buy on the night.

ABOUT THE CATCHERS

Spring 1927. The birth of popular music.

John Coughlin is a song-catcher from New York who has been sent to Appalachia to source and record the local hill-country musicians.

His assignment leads him to small-town Tennessee where he oversees the recording session that will establish his reputation. From here he ventures further south in search of glory. He is chasing what song-catchers call the big fish or the firefly; the song or performer which will make a man rich.

Waylaid at an old plantation house, Coughlin gets wind of a black teenage guitarist, Moss Evans, who runs bootleg liquor in the Mississippi Delta. The Mississippi has flooded, putting the country underwater, but Coughlin is able to locate the boy and bring him out. Coughlin views himself as a saviour.

Others regard him as a thief and exploiter. Coughlin and Moss – the catcher and his catch – pick their way across a ruined, unstable Old South and then turn north through the mountains, heading for New York.

ABOUT XAN BROOKS

Xan Brooks is an award-winning writer, editor and broadcaster. He was one of the founding editorial team at the Big Issue magazine and spent 15-years as a writer and associate editor at the Guardian. His debut, The Clocks in This House All Tell Di­fferent Times, was listed for the Costa First Novel Award, the Author’s Club Award, the Desmond Elliott Prize and the Walter Scott Prize.