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Week of October 1st, 2017 The Commonplace Book | The Southern Bookstore | Read This! | The List | {Book} Trailer Park | Okra Picks | Southern Indie Bestsellers | Events |
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In which Mr. William Alexander Percy sneaks food into a party (and is caught), Mr. Alan Gratz tells us his favorite Xbox game, and Mr. Wendell Berry tells us why he thinks we are here. |
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It is prize season in the book world this week. The National Book Foundation has announced its short list of finalists (her ladyship, the editor, was gratified to see Ms. Jesmyn Ward's Sing, Unburied, Sing on the list). The winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature was revealed (it was a long time in coming, but Mr. Kazuo Ishiguro is certainly deserving of the honor). And closer to home. The 2o17 Fall Okra Picks have been selected (the booksellers responsible would say they have been "picked.") Okra Picks are Southern books that Southern independent booksellers are most looking forward to in the upcoming season. The books, that is, they can't wait to start putting into the hands of their customers. The current list features books that are coming out in October, November, and December of this year. An eclectic selection, all are Southern in nature. All have avid fans among indie booksellers. In other words, "You've got to read these":
Read Independently! And shop local.
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Lady Banks' Pick of the Week |
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Noteworthy poetry and prose from her ladyship's bedside reading stack. |
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Light danced over the dark, inky ocean, and I blinked my eyes awake. No ocean. Just the faint blue of a breaking day casting over the white walls of my bedchamber. A dream still clung damp to my bones. Always the same since I was a child. Sometimes threatening, sometimes euphoric. Breathing in deeply, I fancied the day held the weight of destiny. I picked out the distinctive low rumble of Togo's voice in the melody, the breadth of his voice in correlation to his size. In our few months in South Carolina, I'd already become familiar with how his deep tenor was the base upon which the other Negro voices blended and danced. I came to know that when they sang, they all worked together on some greater task. The harvest. The Negroes were singing because they had begun a harvest. Natasha Boyd, The Indigo Girl (Blackstone, 2017) 9781455137114 top | share this |
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Missy Couhig of The Conundrum Bookstore in St. Francisville, Louisiana, on the delights of recognizing familiar places in the books we're reading. |
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Is it just me, or are there certain words and phrases that just make you smile when you hear them used in conversation or on the news even (imagine the news making you smile these days!) , or read those words or phrases in a book? For me it all started with any mention of July 3. July 3rd is arguably the best day of the year. It is the exact mid-point of the year, in most years it actually has it's own name (aphelion: the point of orbit where the earth is farthest from the sun ), and it is my birthday. But I digress. So hearing July 3rd in a song or reading it in a book has always made me happy . Other words and phrases that make me happy are when people honestly use the word Serendipity in their everyday lexicon (Serendipity has been my favorite word since the third grade when it was the title of my English class textbook reader). Of course, another favorite word is Conundrum. I swear I hear and see it used more and more. I think it is on used on the news at least twice a week (puzzling times we live in ) , and I seem to see it used in nearly every book I pick up. It is even the name of a great book of literary puzzles and a heck of a wine!
So , is it just me ? Or are there words and phrases that make you happy too? --Missy Couhig, The Conundrum Bookstore, St. Francisville, Louisiana
keep reading: Wiley Cash, the haves, and the have-nots
 "What's your favorite Xbox game?"
keep reading: A school visit with Alan Gratz "no one would have dared question why a well-mannered gentleman brought up below the Mason-Dixon had a dinner roll tucked inside his napkin" keep reading: William Alexander Percy, life of the party |
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Read This! Books with Street Cred Recommended reading from Southern Indie Booksellers |
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They All Saw a Cat by Brendan Wenzel ($16.99*, Chronicle Books), recommended by Parnassus Books, Nashville, TN.
Genuine Fraud by E. Lockheart ($18.99*, Delacorte), recommended by Lemuria Books, Jackson, MS.
See What I Have Done by Sarah Schmidt ($26.00*, Atlantic Monthly Press), recommended by Fountain Bookstore, Richmond, VA. |
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keep reading: Wendell Berry to keynote Southword Literary Feast
keep reading: Jesmyn Ward on the National Book Award short list
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The List: Getting to know Guy, Lemuria Books |
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"I know it's difficult, but give us your current top five books."
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"How was it that the deeper of blues--the color of the sky in the predawn hours before the warm sticky blanket of the day folded its weight over our shoulders, the hue that made me think of heaven and fin silk, kings and treasurers beyond imagining, ancient and unfathomable history--could come from that awkward, dusty weed?" |
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The year is 1739. Eliza Lucas is sixteen years old when her father leaves her in charge of their family's three plantations in rural South Carolina and then proceeds to bleed the estates dry in pursuit of his military ambitions. Tensions with the British, and with the Spanish in Florida, just a short way down the coast, are rising, and slaves are starting to become restless. Her mother wants nothing more than for their South Carolina endeavor to fail so they can go back to England. Soon her family is in danger of losing everything. Upon hearing how much the French pay for indigo dye, Eliza believes it's the key to their salvation. But everyone tells her it's impossible, and no one will share the secret to making it. Thwarted at nearly every turn, even by her own family, Eliza finds that her only allies are an aging horticulturalist, an older and married gentleman lawyer, and a slave with whom she strikes a dangerous deal: teach her the intricate thousand-year-old secret process of making indigo dye and in return -- against the laws of the day -- she will teach the slaves to read. So begins an incredible story of love, dangerous and hidden friendships, ambition, betrayal, and sacrifice. Based on historical documents, including Eliza's letters, this is a historical fiction account of how a teenage girl produced indigo dye, which became one of the largest exports out of South Carolina, an export that laid the foundation for the incredible wealth of several Southern families who still live on today. Although largely overlooked by historians, the accomplishments of Eliza Lucas influenced the course of US history. When she passed away in 1793, President George Washington served as a pallbearer at her funeral. This book is set between 1739 and 1744, with romance, intrigue, forbidden friendships, and political and financial threats weaving together to form the story of a remarkable young woman whose actions were before their time: the story of the indigo girl. The Indigo Girl by Natasha Boyd | Blackstone Publishing | 9781455137114 | Read the first chapter
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For the week ending October 1. Books on the Southern Indie Bestseller List that are southern in nature or have been recently recommended by southern indie booksellers.
 The Southern Book Prize |  A SIBA Okra Pick |  Special to the Southern List Printable versions (PDF): Hardcover | Paperback | Children's
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Special to the Southern List
   
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What's happening at Southern Indies across the South? See the full calendar | Find a Southern Indie Bookstore near you. |
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Reading and Booksigning with Johnnie Bernhard (author appearance) Victoria Landis Booksigning (author appearance) New Town Revue: Sharon Harrigan, Rosalie Moffett, Andy Gonzales (author appearance) An Evening with Author Rick Riordan - THE SHIP OF THE DEAD, Book Three, Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard (author appearance) Dinner at the Center of the Earth by Nathan Englander (author appearance) Meet the Author: Toby Tate (author appearance) Armistead Maupin - Logical Family (author appearance)
The Indie Experience (author appearance) Brad Meltzer presents I Am Gandhi and I Am Sacagawea (author appearance)
Garden District Book Shop partners with Save Our Cemeteries (SOC) to present Peter Dedek - Cemeteries of New Orleans: A Cultural History (author appearance) Josh Funk with THE CASE OF THE STINKY STENCH (author appearance) Storytime and Book Launch for Brave with Children's Author Stacy McAnulty (author appearance)
Denise Kiernan – The Last Castle (author appearance) Meet the Author: Lee Dorsey (author appearance) Author Event: Tristina Wright - 27 Hours (author appearance) Author Event: Jeffrey Meyer - A Call to China (author appearance) Ryan Higgins - Bruce's Big Move & Greg Pizzoli - The 12 Days of Christmas (author appearance) Phil Cohen, The Jackson Project: War in the American Workplace (author appearance) In-Store Book Signing with Debut Southern Author William Gerald Hamby (author appearance) Story time with Author Rosalind Bunn (author appearance) Book Signing and Reading with Sandra Worsham (author appearance) Big Dreams, Big Ideas - A Conversation and Signing with Bhu Srinivasan (author appearance) Jimmy Carter: Elected President with Pocket Change and Peanuts: Author Dot Padgett at Serenbe Interfaith (author appearance) Marita Gentry - THE CAJUN CORNBREAD BOY AND THE BUTTERMILK BISCUIT GIRL - book launch (author appearance) Denise Kiernan - The Last Castle (author appearance) HOWARD COVINGTON presents LENDING POWER: How Self-Help Credit Union Turned Small-Time Loans into Big-Time Change (author appearance) James Benn – The Devouring: A Billy Boyle Novel (author appearance)
Real American with Julie Lythcott-Haims (author appearance)
Author Meet & Greet: Chris Mcllwain (author appearance) Billy Reed with MESSAGES FROM LELIA (author appearance) Author Event: D.J. Butler - Witchy EyeAuthor Event: D.J. Butler - Witchy Eye (author appearance) Denise Kiernan - The Last Castle (author appearance) Eryk Pruitt, What We Reckon, in conversation with Katy Munger (author appearance) Author KL Pereira: A DREAM BETWEEN TWO RIVERS (author appearance) Hazel Gaynor & Heather Webb, Last Christmas in Paris (author appearance)
Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan (author appearance)
Adam Gussow / Beyond the Crossroads (author appearance) Amy Reed presents THE NOWHERE GIRLS (author appearance)
Denise Kiernan, The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation's Largest Home (author appearance)
Women's National Book Association of South Florida (author appearance) Sara Camp Milam with THE SOUTHERN FOODWAYS ALLIANCE GUIDE TO COCKTAILS (at City Grocery) (author appearance) Book Launch for The Three Graces of Val-Kill by Emily Herring Wilson (author appearance) Suzy Hansen - Notes on a Foreign Country (author appearance) Ruthie Rosauer presents THESE TREES (author appearance) Author Event: Denise Kiernan - The Last Castle (author appearance) Michael Walden - North Carolina Beyond the Connected Age (author appearance) Read Local Kickoff Party with Author Sara Lewis Holmes (author appearance) Chantel Acevedo (author appearance)
Charlie Jane Anders with ALL THE BIRDS IN THE SKY & Adam Gussow with BEYOND THE CROSSROADS (author appearance) TEACH-IN event with RIMA VESELY-FLAD discussing RACIAL PURITY AND DANGEROUS BODIES: MORAL POLLUTION, BLACK LIVES, AND THE STRUGGLE FOR JUSTICE (author appearance) Doug Stanton - The Odyssey of Echo Company (author appearance) Cathy Davidson, The New Education: How to Revolutionize the University to Prepare Students for a World in Flux (author appearance)
An After Hours Event wit Ann Robbins Phillips (author appearance) |
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Authors Round the South | www.authorsroundthesouth.com
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And finally it is words and names of home that make me happy when I run across them in my reading. Well this week, I hit a home run on this front. I was reading C.H. Lawler's new book Living Among the Dead and on PAGE ONE I see that the main character lives on Prytania Street in New Orleans – I LIVE ON PRYTANIA STREET IN NEW ORLEANS! Then I get to page 41 and I read "At the river across from Bayou Sara, I stopped and pondered the town". I KNOW THAT TOWN! The main character leaves the area for some time and many pages later on page 212 I read "My path headed north, up into a place called the Felicianas." And then a few pages later on page 222 "We had just followed another dead-end trail, one that lead us to the river at Bayou Sara". And all the while the book is flashing back and forth to the narrator who is writing the tale from his bed as an old man, you guessed it on Prytania Street. Since my real life is spent continually travelling between Prytania Street in New Orleans and the Felicianas you can bet I enjoyed seeing it through someone else's eyes as I read the book.
An incredible story of dangerous and hidden friendships, ambition, betrayal, and sacrifice.
| 10/06/2017, 06:00 pm | Lady Banks is sponsored by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, in support of independent bookstores in the South | SIBA | 3806 Yale Dr. | Columbia, SC 28409
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The Last Ballad is Cash's fictionalized account of a woman who should never have been forgotten -- a woman who was only remembered in a few local stories in Gaston County, North Carolina, where the author grew up. Ella May Wiggins worked in the textile mill in Bessemer City, six days a week, twelve hours a day. Her weekly wage was $9.00. Her husband became an alcoholic and left her. She defied racial divisions by moving to "Stumptown" -- a poor African-American neighborhood -- and becoming friends with her neighbors. Four of her nine children died from malnutrition or diseases she couldn't afford to have treated.
The New York Times bestselling author of the celebrated A Land More Kind Than Home and This Dark Road to Mercy returns with this eagerly awaited new novel, set in the Appalachian foothills of North Carolina in 1929 and inspired by actual events. The chronicle of an ordinary woman's struggle for dignity and her rights in a textile mill, The Last Ballad is a moving tale of courage in the face of oppression and injustice, with the emotional power of Ron Rash's Serena, Dennis Lehane's The Given Day, and the unforgettable films Norma Rae and Silkwood.
Fonville Winans began his career by documenting the lives of Depression-Era Cajuns in the coastal town of Grand Isle and later became the official photographer for the state of Louisiana. An enthusiastic tinkerer and occasional inventor, Winans experimented obsessively with recipes.
Browsing the shelves of libraries, book stores and book stalls is one of my favorite things to do. Over the years I have happened upon rare books, books by long forgotten authors and authors unknown at least to me, and have found both delight in discovery and hours of happy reading. So when a well-tailored fellow from Amazon stepped up to the dais of a writers' conference lunch recently and in a cheerful voice declared the end of browsing, I was horrified. He was not, of course, talking about internet browsing. He was talking about my kind of browsing.
Later as impoverished graduate students in New York City I and my friends spent many happy hours browsing in the second hand book stores on Broadway. We were thrilled when we chanced upon often out-of-print volumes whose prices fit out meager budgets. I would not otherwise have happened upon books like Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now or the lesser works of Mark Twain that I still have in my bookcase today.
The 52 micro-memoirs in genre-defying Heating & Cooling offer bright glimpses into a richly lived life, combining the compression of poetry with the truth-telling of nonfiction into one heartfelt, celebratory book. Ranging from childhood recollections to quirky cultural observations, these micro-memoirs build on one another to arrive at a portrait of Beth Ann Fennelly as a wife, mother, writer, and deeply original observer of life's challenges and joys. Some pieces are wistful, some wry, and many reveal the humor buried in our everyday interactions.
So, this is one of those interview questions, right? If you could recommend any book that changed your life, what would it be? This is the question that you prepare for. You never know when it might be asked of you, so you need to make sure when it is asked, that it blows the socks off the person asking. Do you pick something that is dense and difficult to read, and therefore meant to impress the person with your intellect (or really your attention span, because clearly that is really what is most flexed). Or do you pick something seminal, something that was part of a zeitgeist of sorts? Ahh yes, they'll say and immediately connect with you over it. I was a Freshman when that came out. Everyone was talking about it. I'd never known books could resonate like a gong through an entire populace until that moment. That was the moment I truly understood the power of the written word. Or are we just honest about what we love, even if no one else on earth has read it?
Adam Tatum is a disgraced American ex-cop when his British father in law gets him a job with a powerful investment banker. Adam and his young family travel to London and he ends up in a high power conference at 10 Downing St. Soon after his meeting a bomb goes off and he becomes a suspect.
Some people argue that the south isn't really the capital-S South any more. After all, with chain restaurants and social media and people moving in and out of the region (mostly in) all the time, it's pretty easy to make a case that America's growing more homogenized every day. Is an upscale suburb in Atlanta really all that different from a suburb in Seattle or Houston? And if the south is just a slightly more humid version of Everywhere USA, does that mean southern literature is doomed to slowly die out?
Her ladyship, the editor, spent last weekend at the annual fall conference of the 
"Roben Farzad's debut is a fast-paced tale of drugs, sex, and Dom Perignon set in a swanky Miami hotel called The Mutiny. The book seems destined for the silver screen until you realize that it's too ridiculous to believe. But that's the thing: every freaky cocaine-fueled moment, each kingpin ordered assassination, every larger-than-life character, every celebrity cameo is actually real. So, put the soundtrack to Miami Vice on the in the background, grab yourself decadent drink, and settle in for a ripping good read!" -- Kelly, Fountain Bookstore
In the process of cleaning out the office last month, her ladyship, the editor came across a little book written in 1952 by Adolph Kroch ("Honorary life member of the American Booksellers Association") called "Bookstores Can Be Saved." He sets out fourteen proposals that he believes will, well, "save" bookstores from the apparently imminent extinction he sees for them in the near future. His proposals range from the common sense ("Verify localities in need of bookstores and assist qualified booksellers in establishing new outlets there") to the "gee, that would be nice" ("Encourage higher wages") to the sure to be unpopular ("Raise retail prices") to the extremely unlikely ("Booksellers and Publishers set aside a percentage of their volume of business" -- her ladyship thinks he means "profits" -- "to promote campaigns to encourage book buying").
When two estranged sisters reunite for their parents' 50thnanniversary, a family tragedy brings unexpected lessons of hope and healing amid the flowers of their mother's perennial garden.
If an independent bookstore serves as the soul of a community (as do libraries, I believe), then a big piece of my soul resides in two Southern stores: Cavalier House Books in Denham Springs, Louisiana and Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi.
Cavalier House Books
Square Books
INDIES FIRST:
Sheila Ingle's husband John was brought up in Ingle Holler in Union, South Carolina, with eight other Ingle families. They worked together in the mills, shared their gardens, attended church, and enjoyed the playing and singing of the songs from the Grand Ole Opry. When five of the brothers went off to war, those who couldn't fight took care of their families. The Ingles stuck together, just like they were taught in the Appalachian hills of Erwin, Tennessee. Love of God, love of family, and love of country were modeled in each home. In fact, one year Make Ingle put his sons and grandsons together to build Hillside Baptist Church. Adults kept up with the newspapers and the radios; world happenings were important. Any type of sickness brought a barrage of soup and cornbread, because children still had to eat. On those twenty acres, the children played in the creek, cowboys and Indians, and hide-and-seek. They built their own wagons and sleds to race down the hill on the dry, hickory leaves. All the boys learned to shoot a .22 caliber, and John's mother Lois could light a match with her shots. Living in Ingle Holler was home, where each one was accepted.
Eerie, intense, and masterfully-crafted, Hank Early's gripping series debut Heaven's Crooked Finger transports readers to a secretive community in the Georgia mountains.
From a writer who's been praised for her "intelligence, heart, wit" (Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls), The Ice House follows the beleaguered MacKinnons as they weather the possible loss of the family business, a serious medical diagnosis, and the slings and arrows of familial discord.
Name: Mary Ruthless—Born and raised in the mountains of western North Carolina, I was always an avid reader. I taught myself to read at age three because I was too impatient to wait for someone else to read me a story. I was never without a book growing up and my love for reading only grew with each book I read. I received my BA in English Literature from Appalachian State University in 2011 and went on to manage the small bookstore that was in town at the time. When the owner decided to move on and focus on her own writing, I bought it and turned it into Foggy Pine Books. I have a 10 year old son, Liam, who also harbors a deep love of books; two dogs, Anya and Athena; and a cat, Smoke. 
Best part about being a bookseller?: This is such a tough question because I love everything about being a bookseller—from reading new books to putting them in the hands of excited readers. My favorite part, however, is being able to talk about literature all day long. I love engaging with my customers, making recommendations, and learning about new authors from others. I get stopped all the time around (our very small) town because someone recognized me as "the book lady" and just had to tell me about the book they're reading or to ask me about a title in the store. It's humbling and exciting to know that those little conversations about books that I love so much also matter to the people having them with me. 
"Cough. Cough. COUGH!" was the sound of the inevitable winter cold she catches the moment she stops for a moment to take a breath. She will now spend the next two weeks living off oranges and Nyquil, and drinking vast amounts of mint or ginger tea with honey. And reading. Also, wishing she'd bought extra copies of the books she had gifted so that she could read them herself.
OKRA PICK
"An emotionally resonant tale of secrets, regret, and absolution that held me spellbound. You simply have to read it." --Sara Gruen, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Water for Elephants
Annie Butterworth Jones, owner and managing partner of The Bookshelf
Store and location: 
Best thing you did this year at your store: 
"Raw and gripping." --Jason Reynolds, New York Times bestselling coauthor of All American Boys
Fleeing a disastrous love affair, university librarian Amy Webber moves in with her aunt in a quiet, historic mountain town in Virginia. She quickly busies herself with managing a charming public library that requires all her attention with its severe lack of funds and overabundance of eccentric patrons. The last thing she needs is a new, available neighbor whose charm lures her into trouble.
I was a bibliophile of the first order before I could walk. Early as I can remember, having a book to look at held me captivated better than any toy. Eventually I learned the little black marks on a page were words, and those words told a story. That was the moment which ignited my lifetime infatuation of reading, and eventually my writing. Today, I will readily admit – I most certainly have a book problem. It's logical then, I would love any place with books, yet, it's the independent bookstores that reach some innermost sense within me, sparking an emotional connection as strong and robust as first love. To me, their presence in our communities is vital because they offer a variety of enriching, and rewarding programs for all ages. 
Set in the Carolinas in the 1940s, The Road to Bittersweet is a beautifully written, evocative account of a young woman reckoning not just with the unforgiving landscape, but with the rocky emotional terrain that leads from innocence to wisdom.
Jim Byrd is not really obsessed with death, mortality, and ghosts, but after a peculiar health scare, he can't avoid them. From cryonics to psychic mediums, he seems haplessly fated to encounter the full range of mortality cures. Central among them--and deservedly central in this book--is a staircase at the back of an old house where supernatural physics seem to be in control. As a mini-prologue to each chapter, Pierce lays out a montage of events in the life of previous residents and their families. At first these vignettes seem to support a little ghost story. But by the end, they resolve brilliantly into a poignant comment on Jim's misadventures, and what at first was a story concentrated on death and the hereafter satisfyingly becomes a novel about the ephemeral fragility of life itself.
Southern Fiction that Changed My Life and Helped me pen my debut mystery/thriller
Her ladyship, the editor, has spent the last few weeks of cold weather thinking and preparing for spring. That is, she has been paging through her seed catalogs, and drawing ambitious plans for garden plots on graph paper with a sense of scale more optimistic than realistic. She started some of her early flowers indoors (her ladyship is very fond of the old-fashioned snapdragons that grow 3-4 feet tall), and on cold mornings while she is waiting for the kettle to boil for her coffee, she walks the garden paths in her slippers and checks on the bulbs just beginning to break through the soil, and the plants that overwinter, their leaves indifferent to the frosts and dustings of snow.
Fast forward to those writers' conference meetings at Jake's place, The Alabama Booksmith. The Booksmith has never felt like a store to me so much as a salon—a place where people who love books somehow find each other and talk about books, surrounded by books, with Jake as their knowledgeable host and guide.
A breathtaking and poignant story of lost love, second chances, and the power of returning home by Indie-favorite author, Billy Coffey.
The highly-anticipated, provocative debut novel from the "fearless" (The New Yorker) and "distinctive" (San Francisco Chronicle) Jamie Quatro, Fire Sermon charts with bold intimacy and immersive sensuality the life of a married woman in the grip of a magnetic affair
This Narrow Space is incredibly well written, honest, and compelling! While dealing with some very delicate issues, namely the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and life-threatening pediatric illness, Dr. Waldman manages to express his observations and views without voicing any obnoxious political opinions! He is idealistic, yet humble; brilliant, yet ever eager to seek and to learn. He speaks of everyone with respect. I went into this book interested in the cultural and medical experiences of an accomplished physician; I came out blown away by the reflections of a profoundly gifted writer.
A love story that asks: what happens after we die? The debut novel from National Book Award 5 Under 35 Winner and author of the "ridiculously good" (New York Times) collection Hall of Small Mammals.
In The Great Alone, Kristen Hannah captures both the breathtaking beauty and brutal harshness of Alaska. The Allbright family escapes to the state to hopefully banish inner demons and get a fresh start. They are totally unprepared for the starkness, danger and isolation of their new home. Daughter Leni comes of age in this environment and comes to fall in love with the Alaskan wilderness. This book is another sure winner for Hannah!
Marabel's twin brother, Marco, is the Chosen One, prophesied by the Book of Fate to save the kingdom of Magikos. For Marabel, that means always being in Marco's shadow. But when an evil queen kidnaps Marco on their very important 13th birthday, Marabel knows that she has to rescue her brother if no one else will. With help from her best friend and a talking unicorn, Marabel treks across kingdoms to find her brother, a journey that teaches her about friendship and fate, good and evil, and that sometimes a different perspective can help you save the day. For fans of humorous fairy tale classics like Ella Enchanted, and for anyone who is tired of waiting around for their day in the sun.
