Tom Piazza

Tom Piazza is celebrated both as a novelist and as a writer on American music. His books include the novels The Auburn Conference , A Free State , and City of Refuge , the post-Katrina manifesto Why New Orleans Matters , and Devil Sent the Rain , a collection of his essays and journalism. Of Piazza's short-story collection Blues and Trouble , Bob Dylan wrote, "Tom's stories are like the silence in a queer room--they pulsate with nervous electrical tension, reveal the emotions that we can't...See more

Tom Piazza is celebrated both as a novelist and as a writer on American music. His books include the novels The Auburn Conference , A Free State , and City of Refuge , the post-Katrina manifesto Why New Orleans Matters , and Devil Sent the Rain , a collection of his essays and journalism. Of Piazza's short-story collection Blues and Trouble , Bob Dylan wrote, "Tom's stories are like the silence in a queer room--they pulsate with nervous electrical tension, reveal the emotions that we can't define." He was a principal writer for the innovative HBO drama series TREME , and the winner of a GRAMMY Award for his album notes to Martin Scorsese Presents the Blues: A Musical Journey . His writing has appeared in The New York Times , The Atlantic , Bookforum , Oxford American , and many other periodicals. He lives in New Orleans. See less