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Author Angela Davis-Gardner
Discusses Her New Novel, Plum WineOn UNC-TV’s
North Carolina Bookwatch,Friday, October 27, at 9:30 PM, and Sunday, October 29, at 5 PM

Angela Davis-Gardner’s novel Plum Wine features Barbara Jefferson, a young American teaching in Tokyo in the 1960s, is set on a life-changing quest when her Japanese surrogate mother, Michi, dies, leaving her a tansu of homemade plum wines wrapped in rice paper. Within the papers Barbara discovers writings in Japanese calligraphy that comprise a startling personal narrative. With the help of her translator, Seiji Okada, Barbara begins to unravel the mysteries of Michi's life, a story that begins in the early twentieth century and continues through World War II and its aftermath.

In this episode of UNC-TV’s local literary series North Carolina Bookwatch, airing Friday, October 27, at 9:30 PM, author and North Carolina State University professor Angela Davis-Gardner examines the human relationships, cultural differences, and the irreparable consequences of war that runs deep in Plum Wine’s original, and yet timeless, tale.

“The premise of the book is that an American, who is living in Tokyo, is left a chest full of homemade plum wine by her surrogate mother. Each bottle is wrapped in rice paper, and on that rice paper is Japanese writing that she has to have translated; and that gets the novel going,” says Davis-Gardner. “The plum wine really starts it all.”

As Plum Wine’s Barbara and Seiji translate the plum wine papers they form an intimate bond, with Michi a ghostly third in what becomes an increasingly uneasy triangle. Barbara is deeply affected by the revelation that Michi and Seiji are hibakusha, survivors of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima, and even harder for her to understand are the devastating psychological effects wrought by war—a subplot that comes from the author’s own experiences.

“One of the few autobiographical parts of this book was my experience having to do with the Vietnam War while I was in Japan,” says Davis-Gardner. “I went there believing it was a good war and my students began to talk me out of that notion…and I just began to look at war in a different way.”

Angela Davis-Gardner is the author of two critically acclaimed novels, Felice and Forms of Shelter. Her short stories and personal essays have appeared in numerous literary magazines including Shenandoah and The Greensboro Review. She is professor of creative writing at North Carolina State University.

Don’t miss D.G. Martin’s all-new interview with Angela Davis-Gardner on North Carolina Bookwatch, Friday, October 27, at 9:30 PM, with an encore episode airing Sunday, October 29, at 5 PM, only on UNC-TV!

During this season of North Carolina Bookwatch, guests also include: Will Blythe (To Hate Like This is to be Happy Forever), John Hart (The King of Lies), Sarah Dessen (Just Listen), Kristin Henderson (While They’re at War), David Payne (Back to Wando Passo), John Hope Franklin (Mirror to America), Leah Stewart (The Myth of You and Me), Andrew Britton (The American), Allan Gurganus (New Stories of the South), Tom Carlson (Hatteras Blues), Bill Smith (Seasoned in the South), William Leuchtenburg (The White House Looks South), Dot Jackson (Refuge), Art Chansky (Blue Blood),  Mark Ethridge (Grievances), and Paul Leonard (Music of a Thousand Hammers: Inside Habitat for Humanity).

For more information about additional series guests and airdates, plus, the all-new Bookwatch blog and online book club, please visit: www.unctv.org/ncbookwatch.

Funding for North Carolina Bookwatch is provided by UNC-TV members and by Quail Ridge Books and Music, Raleigh’s independent, full service bookstore, bringing readers and writers together since 1984.

North Carolina Bookwatch is part of UNC-TV’s ongoing commitment to produce programs for and about North Carolina. UNC-TV is the statewide 11-station broadcast network of the University of North Carolina. For more information, please visit www.unctv.org/ncbookwatch.

For more information about North Carolina Bookwatch and UNC-TV’s other local productions, please visit our website at www.unctv.org.

—UNC-TV—