Lemuria Books and the Mississippi Book Festival will be hosting an in-person event with best-selling author Greg Iles to celebrate the release of his new novel.
On Tuesday, May 28, at Cathead Distillery in Jackson, Iles will take the stage to talk about Southern Man, the latest book of the Penn Cage series. Happy hour will begin at 5 p.m. with a reading and author talk beginning at 6:30 p.m.
“We are THRILLED to have Greg in town, and we hope you’ll come out to celebrate with us!” officials with the Mississippi Book Festival wrote in an announcement email.
Due to health issues, Iles will not be able to shake hands and sign books. However, pre-signed copies of Southern Man are already available online and will be available at the event for purchase.
Earlier this year, Iles informed readers that he has blood cancer and would be undergoing a stem cell transplant prior to the book’s publication. The Natchez native said he was first diagnosed in 1996 but the disease had ramped up in the last two years.
“In 1996, when I was 36 years old, I was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, an incurable blood cancer that had recently killed Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart. After nearly dying from an experimental treatment, I – with the blessing of my father, the inspiration for Dr. Tom Cage – withdrew from the medical system and continued my writing career, while keeping my illness completely secret,” Iles penned in a letter to fans.
“…Against all odds, I became one of the luckiest patients alive, and survived more than twenty years with a ‘smoldering’ form of cancer, without terminal progression,” Iles continued. “Two years ago, however, my extraordinary run of luck ran out, and myeloma ‘switched on.’ I nearly died before I was even aware that the disease had reawakened. Thankfully, despite myeloma still being classed as incurable, treatments have improved greatly over the intervening years.”
Southern Man is the seventh book in the Penn Cage series, following The Quiet Game, Turning Angel, The Devil’s Punchbowl, The Death Factory, Natchez Burning, The Bone Tree, and Mississippi Blood. The 976-page thriller will hit shelves across both Mississippi and the U.S. later this month.
