Writer of Creative Nonfiction, Fiction, Poetry and Master Photographer
A hundred and fifty eight years ago, the Union army was in New Bern and threatening to move west unchecked. The Confederate leadership showed little interest in making the defense of North Carolina a priority. Gen. John Foster of the Union army started making moves in November New Bern and the 47th North Carolina —…
I was fortunate to be invited to sell and sign my books at Pequod Used Books in Rocky Mount this past weekend. My wife Kristi and I knew there would be a challenge — try not to go too crazy in the store, especially since owner Justin Nale had announced a 50% off everything-sale. We…
It’s hard enough to promote a book and hope it gets noticed and read even in the best of times. COVID-19 has presented any author with a 2020 release plenty of challenges since we can’t get out to do traditional readings. I miss those and the interaction. However, I got some exciting news over the…
My publisher is having a terrific sale on over a thousand of their titles, including my new book, Galvanized: The Odyssey of a Reluctant Carolina Confederate. Just use the code 6FALL20 at checkout and you will get 50% off your entire order. You’ll have to pay sales tax and shipping, but that is still a…
Confederate statues are coming down all over the country, and the one near me — in Rocky Mount, NC — starts getting moved today. The local newspaper said it will take five days and cost over $280,000. Ironically, the original cost to install the statue, in today’s dollars, was about $275,000. In my book Galvanized:…
I was fortunate enough to appear on Rocky Mount’s WHIG-TV recently to talk about Galvanized. Here’s the link:
“Michael Brantley’s Galvanized is a conscientious and sweeping hybrid narrative gathering together fragments of the author’s personal history—that of his great-great-grandfather’s life in nineteenth-century North Carolina—alongside elaborately researched accounts of the Civil War. When Brantley offers, ‘These were the stories that had become interesting to me, the stories about real people, regular people,’ he focuses our attention…
I’ve really enjoyed the emails, texts, posts on social media and responses from readers about Galvanized: The Odyssey of a Reluctant Carolina Confederate. People have sent me copies of documents and photographs, and in some instances, ideas for future blog posts. I love it, and that’s what I started this blog for — to interact…
“‘The Civil War is just as complicated now as the day it started.’ . . . Brantley deftly combines military and social history, a gripping narrative of one private soldier, and his personal struggle to make sense of a savage, fratricidal war and the morally fraught heritage that continues to haunt the South.” —Philip Gerard,…
“As the author’s research reveals the journey of his great-great-grandfather across Nash County and battlefields of the Civil War, Michael K. Brantley discovers that exploring the past reveals the explored but changes the explorer. A worthy literary effort!” —Wade G. Dudley, author of Remembering North Carolina and Splintering the Wooden Wall I was honored to get this quote…