In Night Dreamer Walks, the first eight chapters of a novel of the same name, John M. Groves imagines the predicament of a young Native American man living 8,000 years ago in Oregon's Klamath Basin. Beginning as a story to avenge his father's death during an unusual outbreak of tribal...
The creative writing project Circles in the Sand began as a collection of
interrelated short stories but is now the three opening chapters of a novel, a chapter and an
early draft of what was originally the ending to a novella, and one short story. The
landscape is the upper...
These six stories represent a child's search for identity. The first story, "Road Map," is intended to be independent from the other pieces in this collection, but has been included because it is clearly set in the same place and explores many of the same themes of the other pieces....
My thesis, entitled “The Clerk’s Tale: Literal Monstrosities and Allegorical Problems,” argues that Chaucer’s Clerk is engaging both sides of a binary system. The Clerk has situated himself in a precarious position between two major schools of thought in the medieval culture, Franciscan and Dominican; the former promotes the will...
This thesis, a collection of creative non-fiction essays, explores the nature and influence of reading and school in the author's life. After a brief introduction explaining the title, part one describes the sensory dimensions of reading. Part two discusses the author's work as a student and teacher and the contradictions...
The characters in each of these pieces exist outside the periphery of the so-called norm. In "Through Parted Curtains," "What They Do Besides Eat," and "Two Lambs," June wishes to enter the adult world that tends to exclude her (though she will only enter conditionally). June is, of course, about...
This collection of stories spans a range of content: the personal, the domestic, the political, and the downright terrifying. In “Ilka the Flyer,” a young man is faced with his own crisis and that of his veteran uncle. Sister relationships bloom and fade as the entire family deals with changes...
This collection of stories explores moments of stillness in human relationships: moments during an argument when there is nothing to say, moments of quiet contemplation which precedes inevitable--and often unwelcome--life changes, moments of frustration, confusion, despair, and grace. In the chaotic lives of these characters, stillness is neither tranquil nor...
The eight stories in Wild West Love Songs explore issues such as loss, suffering, and betrayal, but perhaps the most consistent theme is the examination of the ways we are haunted by our past. All the protagonists in these stories are haunted. Sometimes they are haunted literally, by a ghost...
Set in the dryland farming country of Eastern Oregon in the late 1950's, this novel follows a year and a half in the life of a young girl as she comes of age. A water rights dispute, the plight of nearby ranchers, disappointments in her own family and a harrowing...