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He's released three solo albums, two with a band, and has recorded with Iggy Pop, Nick Cave, and Debbie Harry.

He writes books on his phone while riding the bus to work.

Coming up next on Tennessee Writes, we're sitting down with author Jeff Zentner and finding out how he went from the world of music to books and what inspires his writing.

All this and more next.

Books about Tennessee.

Books that come from Tennessee authors.

Books and stories with a Tennessee twist.

West Tennessee PBS presents Tennessee Writes.

[music] Welcome to Tennessee Writes, the show that sits down with authors with a Tennessee connection.

I'm your host, Peter Noll.

Some authors are from Tennessee, others call Tennessee home now, where they've written stories with a Tennessee twist.

Today, Tennessee Writes welcomes author Jeff Zentner, a former recording artist and now author of several young adult novels, and most recently, the book Colton Gentry's Third Act.

Please welcome Jeff Zentner.

Welcome to Tennessee Writes.

Thank you.

It's great to be here.

Jeff, thanks so much for being here.

One of the first questions when we read about your bio is recording artist to author.

How did that transition take place?

I pursued music with the intention of being a professional musician until I hit around 30.

I was taking stock of my musical career at one point, and I realized that very few people tend to make it big in music after age 30.

I thought, "That might be a problem."

I kept plugging away at it for a few more years, and I actually got farther away from living the dream of being a professional musician.

I thought, "I need to try to find something else."

I started volunteering at a music camp called Tennessee Teen Rock Camp and a sister camp called Southern Girls Rock Camp, teaching teenagers how to be rock musicians.

Through that experience, I really fell in love with the way that teenagers love the art that they love.

It's a really special relationship that kids form with that art.

It made me want to make art for young adults.

At the point that I was having this realization, I was 36 years old, which is way too old to be having your big break in music, especially if you want to make music for young adults.

I was going to have to try something else.

I noticed that there's this big new category of books called young adult books, and the publishing industry is a lot more forgiving of advanced age like 36.

I decided to try my hand at writing a young adult book.

That's what I did.

I wrote the first draft of my first young adult book, The Serpent King, on the bus to and from downtown Nashville on my morning commute.

That's true.

It's not just folklore on th.. that you were writing on your phone.

Absolutely true.

My first four books, actually.

Then my job went remote for the most part, and so now I write on my laptop like a normal human being.

Yes, my right thumb got quite a workout in those early years.

Tell us about your journey, your Tennessee connections, your journey to here.

You didn't grow up here, but how did you get here?

Where did you grow up?

-That's right.

I grew up in Lawrence, Kan..

I've always been very, very interested in the South.

Every time I saw portrayals of the South on television or in books, I felt a really strong kinship and connection.

Come to find out doing some genealogy that all my family is from western North Carolina and middle Tennessee, so there might be some ancestral memory going on there.

I moved to Nashville in my early 20s to pursue music, ended up going to school here.

I've lived here ever since, since 2003 with four years in Asheville, North Carolina, which is a place near and dear to my heart, a place that unfortunately is suffering terribly right now with the after effects of Hurricane Helene.

Yes, I've lived in Nashville now for a while.

Why do you love Tennessee?

I love Tennessee.

First of all, it's a beautiful place.

It's an absolutely gorgeous place.

So many of America's great artists are from Tennessee.

So many of our great writers are great musicians.

There's that rich history.

I love Tennesseans.

I love the people of this state.

They're natural storytellers.

As somebody who is drawn to stories, both consuming them and creating them, I want to be around that sort of people.

I love the food.

I love the weather.

I've even made my peace with the humidity.

I've learned that you have to just go out and face it in the summertime.

You have to go out and get sweaty every day and just take a nice cool shower and you'll be fine.

It's good for the skin.

That's right.

You went to writing young adults because of the camp.

The book that I've read, Colton Gentry's Third Act, is your first adult novel?

That's correct.

What made that change?

I had shown myself that I was capable of writing stories, period, and sustained stories, novel-length stories.

I got this idea for a story that I could not write as a young adult book.

If you want to write a story about a 38-year-old country musician whose marriage has fallen apart, who's struggling with alcoholism, who's basically gotten himself canceled from his country music career, you can't write that character as a 17-year-old.

It doesn't really work.

In the publishing industry there is a hard and fast rule about young adult books, which you can take on all sorts of topics, but your protagonist must be a young adult presently.

You cannot even have an adult narrating a story in flashback to when they were a young adult.

The narrator has to be a young adult presently.

This story popped into my head, and it was just simply a story I could not tell as a young adult book.

I had to dip a toe into the realm of grown-up books.

How much of your stories come from your experience of the music world?

A little bit, especially in Colton Gentry's Third Act.

I drew upon experiences I'd had as a musician, connections I had as a musician.

In general, though, for me, one of the beauties of writing is you get to experience other lives.

If I'm just putting my own life on the page time and time again, I'm robbing myself of that experience, of getting to live these other lives, getting to exist in these alternate universes, getting to inhabit these other personalities in the form of characters.

Nashville, where you live, has become, some people call it Nash-Vegas.

Do you have friends, family from outside Tennessee that are coming to visit you all the time because they want to come to Nashville?

Absolutely.

People love Nashville.

It's funny because the reasons why people come to visit Nashville are not generally the reasons why I love Nashville.

People ask me, "Hey, I'm coming to Nashville for the weekend.

What should I do that's fun?"

I'm like, "I don't know.

I don't drink.

I don't go to bars.

What you should do is live in Nashville for 20 years.

That's pretty fun.

Interact with this incredible musical community and the incredible people who live here and the incredible traditions of this place."

I love to live in Nashville.

I don't quite get what people get out of visiting Nashville, but they do.

I'm happy for it.

God bless them.

They bring lots of money into our eco.. Hey, it's a great thing.

Keep coming, folks.

[music] Colton Gentry's Third Act, your first adult novel.

Before we even talk about questions about the book, give a little synopsis so we don't give anything away to our viewers.

Sure.

Colton Gentry's Third Act begins with the titular character, Colton Gentry, on stage.

He's a country music performer.

He's opening for a bigger musical act.

He's in front of an arena crowd.

In many ways, his life is good.

He's married to a massive country star who's about to make the jump over to pop music.

He's got a hit that's climbing the charts.

In other ways, his life is not so good.

He's struggling with alcoholism after the tabloids have been reporting rumors of infidelity on his wife's part.

He is struggling with grief after his best friend was killed in a mass shooting at a country music festival a few weeks earlier.

He goes on stage drunk in front of this arena crowd.

The audience goads him into saying some things that he probably was unwise to say in front of a country music audience.

His career implodes, his marriage ends, everything, it's like a country music song.

Everything just falls apart.

Colton has to move back home to a small town in Kentucky, the fictional town of Venice, Kentucky, spelled like Venice, Italy, but as we know if there is a southern city that's spelled like a European city, the one way you know not to pronounce it is the way that the European city is pronounced.

That is so true.

He moves home to Venice, Kentucky to rebuild his life, and there he discovers that his high school flame has also moved back home and has started a farm-to-table restaurant, and so she ends up hiring Colton to work in her restaurant.

From there, you just got to see what happens.

One thing I really enjoyed about your book is the flashbacks.

They didn't feel forced.

They felt really natural, and it helped the storytelling move along.

Everything about your story seems like I could have read about it in the newspapers or watched TMZ the night before and this really happened because we hear about mass shootings.

We hear about the music stars and the breakups and those with alcohol problems, those that do go back to their hometowns and maybe I've watched too many Hallmark movies, but it was like a love story but it was also a story about finding yourself again, and it was a story about family, his relationship with his dad.

Tell us how much of this maybe was built on your experiences in your personal life.

This one really, very little.

Thankfully, alcoholism has never been anything that I've struggled with.

I've seen people struggle with it.

Certainly, people close to me have struggled with it, and so I've been able to see the toll that it takes.

I will tell you one area where it does intersect very much with my life is in the cooking and the food.

I love Southern food.

I love inventive takes on Southern cuisine.

I love nouveau Southern cuisine.

I love farm-to-table eating.

I love fresh ingredients that we get in the South and Southern foodways.

There was a minute there where I really thought about getting into cooking hardcore.

When I was thinking about music isn't working out, what is going to be my next act, I really considered cooking.

I was reading a lot of chef memoirs at the time, doing a lot of cooking at home, working things out.

Ultimately, I ended up going into writing, and that's worked out well.

This book allowed me to run a restaurant without the risk of running a restaurant, which was really a lot of fun.

Is there going to be a companion cookbook with the recipes on the back?

A lot of cozy mysteries have those recipes throughout the book.

Yes, that's right.

I have been asked that many times.

I don't have any plans for it currently, but never say never.

Were any of these characters based on people you've met or knew?

Yes.

Generally, my characters break down into three parts.

There's like a three-part ratio.

One part is people I know, so every character I write has a little piece of people I've known.

There's a little bit of myself in the character so that I can ground that character in something familiar to me.

Then there is the part that is imagination, the part that is the joy of putting a new personality into the world, a new being into the world, experiencing that joy of creation.

Yes, especially the character of Luann, who is the old flame, is based on people I've known in my life.

Colton is based on people I've known in my life, but not wholly so.

There's definitely strong elements of imagination and invention to them.

The voices of your character are so very realistic that I just thought you were writing from knowledge of these people and how they speak and that world.

I think all of us can imagine if your life falls apart, having to go live with mom and dad again.

I can tell you why that is, and it's a function of the process that I use to write novels.

I've written six novels.

I've published six novels now.

I still don't know how to write a novel.

The only way I know how to write a novel is to cheat, and the way that I cheat is by letting someone else write the novel for me and claiming credit.

That someone else is my characters.

Because I could never sit across from you and say to you, I'm going to tell you your story.

You just sit there and hush, and I'm going to tell you where you've been, where you're going, all those things about yourself.

I could listen while you tell me your story and write that down, and that ends up to be a pretty good story.

What I do to write a novel is I invite characters into my head, and I just listen.

I listen to their voices until I am assured that they're telling me their story, and I'm not telling them their story.

That's the only way I know how to write a novel, and it produces vivid characters.

[music] Now we've come to the part in Tennessee Writes we call our lightning round, where we ask our authors a series of quick book-related questions and see how many they can answer in two minutes.

Do you want to play?

Let's do it.

We'll put two minutes on the clock, and it starts after I ask the first question.

If you can't answer it, say pass.

Favorite book you read for fun during high school?

The Outsiders.

Name the book you think everyone should read.

I don't think there's a book that everyone should read.

What celebrity would you most like to co-author a book with?

Can it be an author?

Sure.

Stephen King.

Who did you give your first published copy of your first book to?

My friend Stephanie Perkins.

Name a fellow author you would like to go on a book tour with.

I just went on a book tour with Brittany Cavallaro, with whom I co-wrote the book Sunrise Nights, and I had a great time, so I'll just retroactively say Brittany.

Whose autobiography is your all-time favorite?

I think Patti Smith's Just Kids, her memoir.

Do you prefer fiction or non-fiction books?

Fiction.

What's the last audio book you finished listening to?

Intermezzo by Sally Rooney.

Most guilty pleasure book you've ever read?

I don't really subscribe to the idea of guilty pleasures.

I guess Tom Clancy.

I love Tom Clancy books, but I despise war.

I hate war and killing.

That's what Tom Clancy books are all about, so I guess that's a little bit of a guilty pleasure, but I grew up loving Tom Clancy books, and I still love Tom Clancy books.

Favorite place to read books?

I love to read books in my hammock at home on just a beautiful autumn afternoon.

How many hours a week on average do you spend reading books?

That's an interesting question, because most of my reading is audio books listened at 2.2 times.. so there's the actual time, or there's the actual hours in the book.

The actual time, whatever that is, it's more than double the amount of time in the audio book, so I would say at least 10 to 15 hours a week, so 20 to 30 hours in audio books.

[music] We'd like to ask you, Jeff, if you'd like to read a little excerpt from your book, Colton Gentry's Third Act.

Fortunately, I have a copy open right here, so I'll go ahead.

Who would have thought?

Thank you.

I'll go ahead and read a section.

Thank you.

This is the section where.. Colton awakes the morning after the cookout at Derek's house with the news of Eddie Lawler's grandkids, the laughter of Derek's children, and the words of the serenity prayer, all reverberating in his mind.

"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference."

Colton doesn't consider himself long on wisdom, but he has enough to know what he can change, and by God, he has the courage to change at least one thing.

He almost trips over the guitar case protruding from under his bed as he's leaving his room and pushes it farther under.

Outside, it's a serene, cool, overcast Sunday morning.

The only sound in the neighborhood is the calling of crows and the dry brown leaves, the texture and color of aged hymnal pages skittering on the driveway.

A trail of leaves swirls out of the bed of his truck as he drives first to Positive Vibes, a tragic locally owned pet supply store next to a vape shop and a strip mall on the outskirts of Venice.

There, he buys a collar, a leash, poop bags, a sack of kibble, the expensive stuff, some treats, a set of doggy dishes, a bed, and a raccoon dog toy.

He proceeds to Man's Best Friend, a shabby cinderblock dog shelter on the other side of town.

He enters in the musk of unwashed dogs, wallops his nostrils.

Shrill, frantic barks reverberate through the building echoing off the bare concrete floor and drab white walls.

Colton didn't do much research into which of Venice's animal shelters was the sorriest, but if this weren't it, it must be damned near and that's exactly what he seeks.

A man with long greasy hair and an unkempt goatee who could be anywhere in age from a rough 25 to 45 sits behind a counter at the front scrolling absent-mindedly on his phone.

He looks up.

"Morning, what can I do you for," he says as Colton approaches.

His glasses looks like he lets the dogs lick them clean.

Judging by his odor, he's doing the shelter dogs in his ward a kindness, not making them envious of how often he gets to bathe.

Colton rests his elbows on the counter.

"I want your sorriest, most broke-down dog."

The man chuckles, barely hesitating.

"I think Petey fits the bill."

"Talk about it."

"Petey, aka Petey Poops, is as much of a mud as they come.

We're not even sure he's 100% dog.

He could have some possum or raccoon mixed in there.

He's old, no idea how old.

He's blind in one eye and can't hear very well.

His right hind leg is messed up.

We think he was used as a bait dog for dog fighters, so he doesn't move real quick.

Not that he has much energy anyway.

Not a big barker either, but he's a sweetheart.

Oh, and we call him Petey Poops because he has diarrhea a lot."

The man makes sure he has Colton's eyes.

A lot.

"Sold.

Lead the way to Petey."

They walk down a long corridor lined with chain-link enclosures.

Dogs of sundry sizes and breeds hurl themselves at Colton with frenzied, deafening barks.

"They all think you're here for them," the man shouts over the den.

Colton winces and nods.

Petey's kennel is near the end.

They arrive to find him lying on a dingy mat, his head resting on his paws.

He looks up solemnly but doesn't bark or otherwise move to acknowledge them.

He's small and lean and looks to be around 25 pounds.

He has black, coarse, wiry fur streaked with silver and the odd patch of white.

He has a graying beard and mustache.

One eye is black, the other is milky as though with a cataract.

All in all, he does, as promised, look like the offspring of a schnauzer's congress with a possum atop a pile of shredded newspaper.

"Hey, Petey Poops, look alive," the man says.

He turns to Colton.

He don't get his hopes up anymore.

"Can I pet him?"

"Sure thing."

The man opens the kennel.

Petey finally rises painfully.

His hind leg is mangled and crooked.

He limps arthritically toward Colton.

Colton crouches, his own infirm knee groaning.

He looks Petey in the eyes and scratches the coarse, greasy fur behind his ears.

"Not to put my thumb on the scale, but Petey has about three weeks left before he's put down.

Either you take him or he crosses the old rainbow bridge.

Either way, it's a comparative win for Petey.

He hasn't had a good life."

"What's your name, man?"

Colton asks.

"Larry."

"Larry, let no one accuse you of being overly sentimental."

Colton continues petting and scratching Petey.

It's obvious from the way Petey is soaking it up that he hasn't had loving contact in a long time.

"We have a little play area out back if you want to run," he makes air quotes, "Petey around and see if you're a good match."

"Nah, I'm good," Colton says.

"Petey's coming with me."

Now there is a postscript to this section.

You won't be able to see it probably, but there is a footnote on page 124 assuring readers Petey will not die in this book.

[music] Jeff, what's coming next from you?

You mentioned earlier in the show that you've got a new book you're working on.

Tell us what's the next big project.

That's right.

Just last week my new book was announced.

It's another adult book.

It's called Love, Like Apples and it is the story of a young man who grows up in Appalachia in East Tennessee under difficult circumstances and he finds his way into puppeteering and he ends up moving to 1970s New York and working on a forgotten PBS show for teenagers called Imagine Nation that employs puppets.

It's really exciting to be talking about this book while in a PBS studio.

When is that one coming out?

That's a really good question.

Probably in 2026.

They just announced it and they'll be hounding you.

When's that next write coming?

That's right.

That's right.

I also have another YA book coming.

This is a YA novel in verse, so written in poems, but I'm co-writing with Brittany Cavallaro.

The same year that Colton Gentry came out, this year, I had a YA verse novel that I co-wrote with Brittany Cavallaro called Sunrise Nights come out.

We've got the second of that two book contract also coming out, and I'm working on that concurrently with Love, Like Apples.

I just wanted to let our viewers know that you have a book out, one of your young adult novels, that is based in Jackson, sort of.

Has a storyline in Jackson on Channel 6.

That's right.

It takes place in Jackson.

It's about two girls who have their own creature feature show on a fictional Jackson public access station, TV 6 in the book.

The book is sort of a coming of age story, the coming of age of their friendship, them having to figure out, if they're going to have to go their separate ways or what will happen.

It is a comedy, young adult, set in Jackson, Tennessee.

It's called, again?

Rayne & Delilah's Midnite Matinee.

I got this one read.

That's next.

Good.

If people want to purchase your books, where do you send them?

I love it when people purchase from Parnassus Books, my local independent bookseller in Nashville.

In Nashville.

That's right.

You can buy signed c.. You can even get it personalized.

If you put in the little online thing, there's a comment box.

You can ask to have it personalized.

I'll get in my car and drive down to Parnassus, and I will personalize a book for you.

Parnassus is great.

I encourage people to buy from Indies.

I understand that's not always possible.

Get it from Amazon, get it from Barnes & Noble.

It's available pretty much wherever books are sold.

Get it at your library.

I like it when people get my books from the library.

Jeff, you have so many great books that need to be on people's next read list.

How should people stay in contact with you?

Yes.

I am on social media platforms @JeffZentner, J-E-F-F, Z as in zebra, E-N-T-N-E-R. That's Instagram, Threads, Facebook.

You can pretty much find me there.

Do you have a website?

I do.

It's JeffZentnerBooks.com.

Do not go to JeffZentner.com.

I am warning you, don't test me on this.

You will be sorry.

I do not own that website.

JeffZentnerBooks.com.

I'm glad I didn't find that website.

Sadly, Jeff, we've come to the end of the show.

We do want to thank you for coming on Tennessee Writes and sharing about your life from music to becoming an author and sharing about your latest adult book and what's coming around the corner for you.

Before you go, would you mind signing us a book to the station?

I'd be happy to.

All right.

We're Channel 11, right?

That's right.

WLJT.

All right.

I'm saying to Channel 11, my favorite PBS station in Jackson, Tennessee.

There we go.

-Thank you so much.

I do appreciate that.

-Thank you, sir.

Thanks for having me.

This has been-- [music] For comments about today's show or to suggest a Tennessee author for a future program, email us at tennesseewrites@westtnpbs.org.

Tennessee Writes, on air and streaming now.

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