Three Chords And The Truth

Explores the passionate life of country music, its entire spectrum and the process of making stars.

After a few tiring years on the road, nationally known singer Henna James takes a sabbatical and visits her dear friend, Monica. During her search for rejuvenation and inspiration for her next CD, she meets Craig, Monica's flighty, womanizing younger brother. Sparks fly between these two very different people. Henna falls harder than she cares to admit. Craig, too, is having feelings he's never experienced before; but Craig hasn't been completely honest. He has a long-distance girlfriend, Nia, who suddenly pops into town and delivers a commitment ultimatum. She is tired of their on again/off again relationship, and she is ready to be married. Craig is torn, but ultimately his decision is made for him. Henna learns about Nia and quickly ends the affair with Craig. Seeing no hope of reconciliation with Henna, Craig proposes to Nia, but before the wedding takes place, Henna delivers some surprising information that could change everything. Now each of them has decisions to make. Is Craig ready to become responsible for the first time in his life? And if Henna decides to take him back, will she ever be able to truly forgive him? Three Chords and the Truth is about leaving emotional baggage behind, trusting the heart after being hurt, and loving outside your comfort zone.

In 2007, the Hector Lassiter series launched with "Head Games," a literary thriller set along the borderlands of 1957 America-a road novel that met with ecstatic reviews and international awards attention, including Edgar and Anthony nominations for Best First Novel by an American Author. With "Three Chords & The Truth," Craig McDonald at last sets the capstone on the Hector Lassiter series and legend. Winter, 1958: Nashville, Tennessee is locked in an icy snow storm doing nothing to cool racial tensions in Music City, USA, or points farther south. Following a midair collision, a U.S. military crew has been forced to dump a hydrogen bomb off the coast of South Carolina-a deadly device still there today, a weapon of mass destruction whose nuclear trigger may be rusting at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, potentially still threatening the east coast well into the 21st Century. Once again, forgotten history and historical figures are reanimated and given new life and relevance through the Hector Lassiter series-nothing less than a literary secret history of 20th Century America. In an up-from-the-heels voice that recalls his first-person narration of "Head Games," Hector once again tells his own remarkable story, one that rounds out the saga BookPage has called "wildly inventive" and The Chicago Tribune calls "the most unusual, and readable crime fiction to come along in years." This is a vintage Lassiter novel, at last revealing the ultimate fate of the author-screenwriter famous for living what he wrote and writing about what he lived. "[The Lassiter novels] are compelling, thrilling and darkly humorous. Lassiter is a brilliant creation- a crime writer who learned his trade with Ernest Hemingway and the Lost Generation in Paris in the 1920s. He is also a man who seems dangerously prone to violent intrigue, doomed love affairs, tragic marriages and military campaigns (he's a veteran of the Punitive Expedition, World War One, the Spanish Civil War and World War Two). Lassiter witnesses history unfolding and, occasionally, has a role in shaping it course. With "Three Chords and the Truth," Craig McDonald has crafted a remarkable coda to the series." -Steve Powell, The Venetian Vase "With each of his Hector Lassiter novels, Craig McDonald has stretched his canvas wider and unfurled tales of increasingly greater resonance." -Megan Abbott "Reading a Hector Lassiter novel is like having a great uncle pull you aside, pour you a tumbler of rye, and tell you a story about how the 20th century 'really' went down." -Duane Swierczynski

The rich and colorful story of America's most popular music and the singers and songwriters who captivated, entertained, and consoled listeners throughout the twentieth century--based on the upcoming eight-part film series to air on PBS in September 2019 This gorgeously illustrated and hugely entertaining history begins where country music itself emerged: the American South, where people sang to themselves and to their families at home and in church, and where they danced to fiddle tunes on Saturday nights. With the birth of radio in the 1920s, the songs moved from small towns, mountain hollers, and the wide-open West to become the music of an entire nation--a diverse range of sounds and styles from honky tonk to gospel to bluegrass to rockabilly, leading up through the decades to the music's massive commercial success today. But above all, Country Music is the story of the musicians. Here is Hank Williams's tragic honky tonk life, Dolly Parton rising to fame from a dirt-poor childhood, and Loretta Lynn turning her experiences into songs that spoke to women everywhere. Here too are interviews with the genre's biggest stars, including the likes of Merle Haggard to Garth Brooks to Rosanne Cash. Rife with rare photographs and endlessly fascinating anecdotes, the stories in this sweeping yet intimate history will captivate longtime country fans and introduce new listeners to an extraordinary body of music that lies at the very center of the American experience.