Erin Austen Abbott is the author/photographer of Small Town Living – A Coast-to-Coast Guide to People, Places and Communities (Running Press). The book is a celebration of the joys of small-town life.

The book serves as a national photographic ode to country stores, main streets, and the inspiring people – from aquaculture preservationists to visual artists to entrepreneurs – who have opted for cozy towns over metropolitan bustle, who have embraced life outside the city center.

“An idyllic celebration of the rural life.” —Publishers Weekly

Erin Austen Abbott spent her early adult life traveling through major cities before making the decision to settle in a small town in Mississippi.

She is an active community member and advocates for the advancement of arts.

Her writing and photography has been published in Esquire, Bon Appetit, Design Sponge, Southern Living, First + Main, and more.

She’s been featured in The New York Times, Anthology Magazine, Domino, and Sage Living by Anne Sage, among others.

Bluesman Little Willie Farmer’s latest album is The Man From the Hill (Big Legal Mess). The disc was produced by Bruce Watson at his Memphis based Delta-Sonic Sound Studio.

The album features Farmer alongside Jimbo Mathus and session drummer George Sluppick.

Farmer serves up some funky North Mississippi Hill Country blues on the album with crunchy guitars and even dips into gospel, singing harmony with Memphis’ Barnes Brothers on [the Sensational Nightingales’] “At the Meeting.”

Farmer’s previous album was 2017’s “I’m Coming Back Home,” released on the German Wolf label.

For the past 30 years Farmer has run his own auto repair shop but says he’s ready for a change.

“I’m trying to get out of that shop,” he declares. “I’m tired of messing with those cars. It’s been a long time.”

W8ING4UFOs is an alternative rock band from Atlanta, GA. Their latest release is the EP, The Seeing Machine. Their previous release was the album, Don’t Let the Asshats Burn You (Striped Light).

Creative Loafing said W8ing4UFOs is “one of our town’s most idiosyncratic, literarily astute bands.”

Bill Taft, of W8ing4UFOs is also the academic director for Common Good Atlanta that provides free college instruction in the arts to the incarcerated. Some of this work is featured in the exhibit, See Us Differently.

The exhibit features bookmaking, painting, mixed media sculptures and graphic narratives based on “Paradise Lost” and “Frankenstein,” all created by currently and formerly incarcerated individuals taking courses through Common Good Atlanta.

Author/photographer Chuck Steffen’s photos and essays have covered topics and settings including the American South (Oxford, New Orleans, Clarksdale, and more), US labor politics and the heartbreak of the homeless.

A reception for Steffen and an exhibition of his work, “Framing Capitalism in Place,” will be held, 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm, in the front room of the Powerhouse, Thursday (Sept. 26), just before Thacker and following the show.

Steffen will also make a brief appearance on Thacker Mountain Radio Hour.

A Los Angeles native, Steffen is retired after a forty-year teaching career at Murray State University and Georgia State University.