-
Get a Free Issue
of our Ezine!
Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
Gary Krist has written for the New York Times, Esquire, Salon, the Washington Post Book World, and elsewhere. He is the author of the bestselling City of Scoundrels and the acclaimed The White Cascade, as well as several works of fiction. He has been the recipient of the Stephen Crane Award, the Sue Kaufman Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Lowell Thomas Gold Medal for Travel Journalism, and a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
This bio was last updated on 11/04/2014. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.
Q. What drew you to New Orleans as your subject?
A. I love the fact that New Orleans was the first major American metropolis to build an opera house but the last to build a sewer system. The city really was (and is) an original, arising from a confluence of ethnicities and traditions unlike that of any other city in the country. As a result, it developed a unique urban culture - not quite foreign, but not quite American either - that was particularly fascinating to me. Certainly the indulgent, cosmopolitan ethos of New Orleans was entirely different from the culture of the last place I wrote about - Chicago, a frenetic industrial giant representing the epitome of no-nonsense businesslike practicality. So that contrast is one of the things that drew me to New Orleans this time around - I wanted to see how the social, racial, and moral issues of the times played out in these two very different urban settings.
Q. New Orleans has a long and storied history. Why did you choose to home in on this particular thirty-year period of the early twentieth century?
A. I've made the Progressive Era something of a personal specialty in my recent books, mainly because I see it as a crucial age of transition, marking the beginning of ...
William Dalrymple is the author of six previous acclaimed works of history and travel, including City of Djinns, which won the Young British Writer of the Year Prize and the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award; the best-selling ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
Empire of Sin
Try:
Nine Lives
by William Dalrymple
Sheri Fink's reporting has won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Magazine Award, and the Overseas Press Club Lowell Thomas Award, among other journalism prizes. Her coverage of Hurricanes Sandy and Isaac received the Mike ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
Empire of Sin
Try:
Five Days at Memorial
by Sheri Fink
We recommend 5 similar authors
We'll Prescribe You a Cat
by Syou Ishida
Discover the bestselling Japanese novel celebrating the healing power of cats.
.png)
Before the Mango Ripens by Afabwaje Kurian
Both epic and intimate, this debut announces a brilliant new talent for readers of Imbolo Mbue and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
